


Radiant Darkness

by deathandthemaiden



Category: Shadowhunters (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Politics, Canon Gay Character, Canon-Typical Violence, Codependent Siblings, Drug Use, Friends to Lovers, Heavy Angst, Homophobia, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Internalized Homophobia, Lightwood Siblings, Lightwood Siblings OT3, M/M, Mutual Pining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-23
Updated: 2017-10-06
Packaged: 2018-10-09 10:01:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 105,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10409631
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/deathandthemaiden/pseuds/deathandthemaiden
Summary: Jace Wayland has lived with the Lightwood family since his father died in a fire nine years ago. Alec Lightwood has everything he could ever want; he's about to graduate from Harvard with his best friend/brother at his side, and is the heir apparent to the Lightwood political dynasty. But a chance encounter with international pop star Magnus Bane turns his world upside down. When Jace uncovers long-buried secrets about the Wayland family, both boys are set on a crash course of self-discovery that forces them to realize just what exactly they mean to each other. Izzy Lightwood figured the whole thing out years ago and honestly just wishes they'd hurry up.





	1. Fireproof

  
There wasn't anyway for anyone to settle in  
You made a slow disaster out of me  
There's a radiant darkness upon us  
I don't want you to worry  
I was careful but nothing is harmless  
Baby, you better hurry

_“You Were a Kindness”, The National  
_

**Jace, 20**

The thing Jace remembers most is the sound. Not the smell of the fire, heavy and nauseating as it was, but the sound. The crackling of the wood beams as the building collapsed around them, like the Earth itself was caving in. The sirens of the firemen’s trucks, splitting through the night. But really, it was the screaming. People aren’t supposed to make that kind of sound. Something horrific and animal and raw has to be happening for a human to sound like that. Jace guesses feeling your fucking flesh melt from your bones qualifies.

He had hidden, the wooden slats of his bedframe pressed into his face. They always tell kids not to do that; they should go to the firemen because they’re there to help you. But honestly, Jace was pretty sure he had forgotten about the fire once he heard those screams. The only thing he cared about was never having to see the thing that was making them. And he hadn’t. They had carried him out of the apartment and he had never seen his father or his home again.

Jace flops over onto his back. Nine years of living with the Lightwoods and he’s still not used to what they collectively deem mandatory for a suitable mattress. Michael wasn’t a perfect father, but he always made sure they had somewhere to sleep. Even if it was just a blanket on the floor, which Jace thinks may actually be worth a try tonight as he’s clearly not going to get anywhere with this Tempurpedic bullshit. He sighs, turning onto his side again. It’s got to be past 3AM.

But then there’s a soft knock on the wall - one flat open handed knock, then two quick taps. Alec. Jace feels the corner of his mouth tugging up in a smile. It’s not like it’s been more than 6 hours since he last saw his brother, but still. “Come in,” he whispers. Alec pushes the concealed door open and steps out from behind the wood paneling. The passage connecting their bedrooms had once been used by servants of the original Lightwood clan (who apparently expected a high level of attentiveness from their staff) but it had long since been commandeered by the boys for late night visits.

Alec pushes his hair out of his eyes, grinning at Jace. “I knew you’d be awake,” Alec whispers. He crosses the room and climbs up on the bed, folding his legs gracefully underneath him. Alec always moved like a dancer, even when the growth spurt hit at 15 and he was suddenly seven inches taller than Jace.

“Don’t be so proud of yourself, it was a safe bet.”

Alec ignores him, looking around the bedroom. “It’s always weird to be back, isn’t it?”

“I guess.”

“All that time away at school but then we get back here and it’s like we’re little kids again.”

“That why you snuck in here to bother me? Old times sake and all?”

Alec shoves him playfully. “Like you weren’t laying here hoping I’d come visit.”

The boys laugh, the comforting familiarity of being back together in their childhood bedrooms settling around them.

“Izzy still coming back tomorrow?” Jace asks. He misses his sister in a way that feels physical sometimes. She’s so much a part of him, the way Alec is, that he often doesn’t realize what’s been wrong with him until she’s back in the room and he can breathe again. It’s the same with Alec, which he supposes was part of the reason he agreed to go to Harvard with him. Harvard. He tries not to think about it.

“Yep. She’s taking the jet in the afternoon.”

“Ugh, that bitch. I bet she set it up that way on purpose, to miss church.”

“You better come with me tomorrow,” Alec demands, suddenly serious.

“When are you going to tell your parents you don’t give a shit about Catholicism?”

“When I’m burying them. In the ground. And they’ve had nice Catholic funerals.”

Jace laughs. “I’m not going.”

“Um, yes. You are.”

Jace ignores him and turns over. “I’m going back to sleep, that’s where I’m going”. He feels Alec lay down next to him and lifts up the comforter, allowing Alec to climb in. Falling asleep in the same bed as Alec was second nature to Jace, although both would rather have died than allowed any of their friends at school to hear about it. But they were home now. Home and safe.

“Jace?” Alec’s voice catches a little.

“What?”

Alec shifts next to him. “What are you going to do this summer?”

Jace is glad he has his back to Alec. “Don’t worry, I won’t distract you from your fancy internship.”

“You know that’s not why I’m asking,” Alec says sternly, sounding more like his mother than Jace would ever dare to tell him.

“Think you’ll have convinced the D.A. to give you his job by the end of the summer?”

“You’re terrible at dodging questions, you know that right?”

“Actually, I’m really, really good at it.” Jace closes his eyes, but Alec is clearly still waiting for an answer. “I don’t know, Alec. Train, I guess.”

“Hm.”

“‘Hm’ what? What do you think I should do?”

“Oh don’t ask me, I’m just the intern,” says Alec.

Jace laughs and jabs his elbow behind him, hoping to make contact with some part of Alec.

“Go to sleep,” Jace says. “We have church in the morning.” Without turning to look, he knows Alec is grinning smugly.

And, as it has so many nights before, the steady breathing of his brother is what finally lulls Jace to sleep.

 

**Alec, 11**

Alec has always been a deep sleeper. Which is why he realizes, slowly, foggily, that whoever is screaming right now must be screaming really, really loudly. He sits up in bed. It must be the new boy. Jace. Alec had heard his name for the first time yesterday, when Mother announced that a boy was coming to stay with them that evening and could Alec please go put on a clean shirt before dinner, thank you very much.

Izzy had asked how long he would be staying with them for, her dark eyebrows knitted together, making even her nine year old baby face look world weary. Nobody had answered her. Usually, nobody answered them.

The boy is still crying. Alec isn’t sure what to do. He supposes he could call for Rosie, the nanny. But Alec keeps picturing the boy’s eyes. They didn’t seem like eyes that would want to see a nanny fussing over him. Maybe he could wake Izzy. Izzy, who would roll her eyes and tell him to mind his own business. No, there was nothing for it. It would have to be Alec.

He slips out of bed and into the hallway. The boys’ rooms are next to each other, which is nice. Izzy’s room is all the way at the other wing of the second floor, and sometimes it feels impossible to track her down. Alec knocks half-heartedly, then tries the door. It’s locked. He considers just going back to bed, but forces himself to knock once more. And then the handle turns and the puffy, pale face of Jace Wayland peers through the crack.

“I’m sorry,” Jace says immediately.

“It’s ok!” Alec realizes he hadn’t gotten much past the knocking part when coming up with this plan. “Um. Can I come in?”

Jace nods and steps aside. “I’m sorry,” he says again. “I was just - you know - nightmare.”

“Yeah,” Alec looks around the room, wildly hoping someone else will leap out and take over. “I just thought I’d come say hi.”

Jace nods, pacing his way around the room a bit in silence. And then - “I get it if you hate me.”

“What! Why would I?” Alec is genuinely baffled.

“I’d hate me. Coming into your house. Living with your family. Taking your stuff. I get it if you want me to leave.”

Alec shakes his head. He sits down on the edge of Jace’s bed, mostly for something to do. “We have a lot of stuff. You can take whatever you want.”

Jace laughs. “Why is your house so big?”

Alec doesn’t know what to say. He didn’t even know people were allowed to ask questions like that. “Um. My dad is a Senator.”

“Like for America?” Jace asks.

“Yeah.”

“Shit.” Jace wanders back over to the bed and climbs up, sitting across from Alec. “That’s cool.”

The boys are quiet for a moment, weighted with a tension Alec isn’t sure he has a name for.

“This is really weird,” Jace says finally.

Alec laughs.

“I mean, I’m glad I’m here. It’s just weird that my dad never mentioned you guys before.”

“I’m sorry. About your dad.” Alec says, wishing he had something better to offer this strange, sad boy.

“It’s okay,” Jace says automatically.

“My parents had never mentioned you guys before either.”

“Weird,” Jace says again, picking at the comforter on his bed.

“My mom said she knew your mom”

Jace perks up. “She did?”

“Yeah. They were old friends, I think.”

“I never knew my mom. She died, when I was a baby. My sister too.”

“Whoa.”

“It’s okay. I never really knew them.”

“Your whole family…” Alec says, overwhelmed. He kicks himself for being so stupid. _He knows his whole family is dead, you don’t have to remind him!?!_

Jace nods slowly.

“Well. We’re your family now,” Alec says.

Jace smiles. “I’m sorry I woke you up.”

“I don’t mind. Want me to stay in here with you?”

“Oh -”

“I mean. I don’t have to. I’ll go back. To my room. I just thought maybe you wanted, you know, to not be alone. My sister used to be really scared of the dark, so she would sleep in my room, and I think it helped her. Not be scared, I mean.” Alec knows he’s rambling. _What was he even talking about? Jace was cool. Jace didn’t want some weird kid to sleep in his room._

“No. That would be nice. Thank you.”

Both boys lay down. There’s an immediate comfort, a connection that feels to Alec like a life preserver he didn’t know he was trying to grab. Alec, rich and careful and coddled, and Jace, scrappy and tough and already weighted down with loss and grief - it shouldn’t work. It doesn’t make sense. But Alec thinks it might just turn out to be the best thing that ever happened to him.

 

**Alec, 20**

Jace is gone when Alec wakes up. Probably running. Jace is always running. He’s ostensibly training for boxing, but Alec has watched him run and he doesn’t think people can run like that unless they’re also trying to run away from themselves. Jace. Jace. Jace. Since that night, nine years ago, Alec’s world began and ended with Jace Wayland. Alec catches himself. There’s no reason to go down this path. It ends somewhere Jace can’t follow, so Alec has built a wall around it, enclosing the secret -- the swirling, slippery mess where feelings morph into each other and lines get blurred and Alec feels like he’ll never find a foothold. He doesn’t need to go there anymore. It doesn’t help anyone. He wills himself out of bed and slips back through the passage to his room to get dressed.

Alec is pulling a shirt over his head when he hears Jace banging back into his room. Jace is always banging into rooms, throwing his body around carelessly, taking up space, unaware of the way people follow his muscled form. “It’s not about how you look, it’s about how you _swagger_ ,” he told Alec once, at some godawful frat party. Alec had rolled his eyes. It absolutely was about how Jace looked, with his different colored eyes and stupidly strong jaw. Jace was the best boxer at Harvard by far, and one of the best in the country, although he would punch anyone who pointed that out. He didn’t want to pursue it professionally. He would also punch anyone who suggested that. Alec was always worried that their parents had pushed Jace too hard. Pushed him to be like them, pushed him to go to Harvard. Or maybe it was Alec who had pushed him to go to Harvard with him. Alec didn’t want to think about that. No. It had been the right thing to do. Jace needed to go to school and Alec needed Jace to be with him.

For Alec Lightwood, life had always followed a fairly straight line. He knew what schools he needed to attend, what clubs he needed to join, what internships he needed to have; everything that was expected of him as the eldest son in a political dynasty. His days consisted of fundraisers for his father’s campaigns, charity appearances with his mother and Izzy, handshakes, ties, American flag pins, champagne flutes, mass, tennis lessons, elite internships, private planes, and always, always, always the family’s reputation at the front of his mind. Everything he did, everything he said, everything he wrote came back to his family, to his father. Duty and honor. That was the Lightwood way.

The only piece that didn’t fit neatly into this tightly prescribed life was Jace. Alec still didn’t completely understand what had possessed his mother to adopt Jace. There was a part of him that secretly wondered if it was just more political posturing - the headlines were certainly nice, _Senator Lightwood Welcomes Orphan into His Home_ and all that. Okay, so Alec was pretty sure there hadn’t actually been headlines. But his father had certainly talked about it a lot that year, which also happened to be a reelection year. Alec didn’t care why they had done it. Jace had saved Alec, in ways he would never even know.

As if on cue, Jace bursts through the passageway door. He’s shirtless, a sheen of sweat glittering on his skin. His chest and arms are covered in tattoos (Alec can still remember Mother’s reaction that night Jace came home with his first tattoo. They had long since given that up as a lost cause though. Fortunately, Alec’s tattoo remains undiscovered by the parental units).

“What happened to _knocking_ , Jace. I seem to remember one of us making a very big deal about the need for consistent knocking. And it wasn’t me.”

Jace waves him off. He’s utterly unselfconscious in his skin, so Alec lets himself stare at his brother. “Your dad is coming back for dinner tonight. Rosie just told me,” Jace says.

“Really?” Senator Lightwood rarely left DC, preferring his studio apartment there to the Lightwood family estate in Bethesda, Maryland.

Jace shrugs. “That’s the rumor. I think he missed his favorite son. Me. To be clear.”

Alec rolls his eyes. Robert tended to make his preference for his biological son explicitly clear in front of Jace. “Take a shower, you heathen. We’re late for church.”

Jace swears at him all way back through the passage.

 

**Jace, 20**

They hear Izzy’s helicopter arriving before they see it. Jace and Alec are in the kitchen, Alec reviewing some of the briefs the DA’s office had sent over while Jace helps Rosie chop onions. They make her cry, so she always chases down Jace to help. The roar of the helicopter is deafening, and Jace all but drops his knife when he hears it. Alec has jumped up too and then they’re racing up to the landing pad on the roof of the mansion.

Isabelle is even more beautiful than she was before she left for her freshman year at Vanderbilt, which seems impossible. And of course she’s wearing a skin tight leather dress, as one does for traveling. She runs to Alec and he picks her up, spinning her around like he’s in an old romance film. Jace smiles, watching them. They look so much alike, the Lightwood siblings. Even after all these years, no matter how close the three of them were, there was always something between them he couldn’t quite touch. Something in the blood. But then Izzy sees Jace and screeches and runs to him too and the three of them are hugging and that’s all there is, for a moment, before Izzy is dragging them inside, away from the noise of the helicopter so they can say a proper hello.

Once they’re safely in the hallway, Izzy rounds on Jace.

“Your arms were _not_ like this when I left,” Izzy laughs, squeezing his bicep.

“What are you talking about, he’s always been ripped,” Alec says.

“Shut up,” Jace says, rolling his eyes.

“Good point, we’re letting her distract us from the real issue here, which is obviously Izzy’s dress,” Alec laughs.

“What’s wrong with my dress?”

“You better change,” Jace warns. “Your father is driving in for dinner.”

“Oh fuck,” Izzy rolls her eyes. “Fine. But the three of us are going out tonight. And I’m wearing the dress.”

“Um, no, we’re not,” Alec corrects.

Alec and Izzy descend into bickering, and, with years of practice behind him, Jace lets himself tune out the argument, instead just letting the sound of his two favorite voices in the world wash over him. They’re interrupted by Maryse, who descends on the three in a wave of maternal energy and Chanel No. 9.

“My beautiful girl.” She hugs Izzy tightly. “You should change before Father gets here.”

Izzy throws up her hands. “Why is everyone suddenly so invested in my outfits?”

Maryse hugs her daughter again. “Isabelle, go get changed and then come tell me everything. Alec, will you help me set the table? I think we’ll eat in the formal room tonight. It’s a special occasion, with all my children back under one roof.”

Alec kisses his sister on the cheek and follows his mom away. Isabelle’s smile drops as soon as Alec and her mother are gone, and she rounds on Jace. “Help me with my bags? I need to talk to you about something.”

Jace nods, instantly concerned with what Izzy might have gotten herself into now. Izzy had made it to about age thirteen before she made it explicitly clear that she never wanted her big brothers to fight her battles for her, but sometimes he and Alec had still (quietly) gotten involved. Izzy could handle herself, but some people couldn’t handle her. She was beautiful and unafraid and lived on her own terms, which didn’t sit well with some people (usually men, usually over 30, usually with wives in other cities).

Izzy throws her bags down on her palatial bed, which sits on an actual dais in the middle of her bedroom. Izzy is nothing if not committed to an aesthetic.

“Okay, help me get out of this dress. Don’t tell the others but it’s actually fucking uncomfortable as fuck.”

Jace laughs as Izzy pulls her hair over her shoulder and turns her back on him. He unzips her dress and she pulls it off, standing before him in her underwear. Jace turns away slightly, for the sake of his sister’s modesty (not that she’s ever cared about her modesty, but he feels one of them ought to at least make an effort).

“What did you want to talk about? Are you okay, Iz?” He turns back around as she’s finishing pulling a shirt dress over her head.

“I’m fine. I just - Listen, I don’t know if it means anything, or if it’s stupid and I shouldn’t even bother to tell you. But I felt weird. Not telling you. I found this, last weekend. I wanted to wait, until we were together, to show you, you know.” Izzy pulls a folder from her purse.

“Ok.”

“So my final, for my politics seminar, I was doing it on broken window policing in Nashville, you know? Which, by the way, is super fucked up. We should see if Father can do anything about police reform there, because like, Jesus fucking Christ. But anyway. So I was like, reading the newspapers, especially the crime blotters, because I had to keep tabs on all this and like pull all this data, for my project, right?”

“Izzy, where is this going?”

“God, I am _explaining_. Anyway. So last week, I’m just reading the local paper. And I see this announcement.” She passes the newspaper clipping from her folder to Jace. It’s short, only two sentences. Izzy recites it before he can even process what he’s looking at. “Michael Wayland, booked on Lafayette St. on suspicion of breaking and entering, intent to commit burglary, and intent to cause bodily harm. Released next morning, without charges.”

“Izzy - “

“I know. But then I googled it, right? Just to see if anything else came up.” She passes a computer print out over. It’s another arrest report on Michael Wayland. And this one includes a very grainy, very over saturated, but still very much there mugshot. A mugshot of a man who looks an awful lot like Jace’s father. “It’s from four years ago. The picture.”

“Izzy. Michael Wayland is dead. I was there.”

“I _know_ that. I know. And I’m sorry, Jace. I’m not trying to like, upset you, for no reason, or anything. But, that picture, it just looked so much like the one you’ve got framed, in your room, from when you were a kid, you know? And I couldn’t not show you. Because what if -”

Jace puts his arm on Izzy’s shoulder. “It’s okay, seriously. Thank you for telling me. But it’s a common enough name, and the photo is blurry. The Michael Wayland I knew is dead.”

“I know. I’m sorry, I just didn’t know what to do.” Izzy throws her arms around him, and Jace holds her tightly. He realizes how anxious she was to tell him. Izzy, who had always been his and Alec’s rock, always feeling what they were feeling before either of them had even realized it and then pulling them through it. He kisses her on the forehead.

“It’s okay. Can I keep these, though?”

Izzy nods fervently.

“I’m going to take them to my room. Go see your mom. You don’t know how much she missed you. I’ll be right down.” It occurs to Jace that his own voice sounds oddly robotic. He feels slightly outside his own body, as if he was observing this conversation play out between Izzy and a different version of himself. He kisses his sister again and leaves, clutching the two pieces of paper tightly.

Back in his own room, he sits on the bed, staring at the mug shot. _It’s not him. I saw the coffin. I heard him die. You do not have a father anymore_ , he reminds himself. Of course, he has the Senator, but the Senator’s never been a father to him the way Michael was. God, he had loved Michael. But Michael was dead. And that was that.

 

**Jace, 12**

Jace is in Senator Lightwood’s office, swinging his feet, which don’t quite touch the floor yet. He’s waiting, although he’s not sure what for. He was told to wait in the office, so he’s waiting in the office.

Senator Lightwood enters, and Jace jumps to his feet. “Sir.”

“You can sit down, Jace.” The Senator sits behind his desk, assessing Jace. It feels a little like he’s being x-rayed. “So. I hear you got yourself into a fight at school.”

Oh. That. Jace personally didn’t think what they were all calling a “fight” even really counted as anything above a “conversation”.

“It wasn’t really a fight, sir, I just -”

“I wasn’t done speaking. You punched your classmate, three times. In the kidney, according to your principal.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What in God’s name possessed you to do something like that?”

“He hit a girl. Sir.”

Jace is pretty sure the Senator almost smiles. “Nonetheless, Jace. That is not how we solve problems. People living under my roof do not brawl like street urchins.”

Jace doesn’t know what a street urchin is, but he assumes that in his former life with his father, he would have qualified as one, as something that merited the level of disgust he heard in the Senator’s voice.

“I’m sorry, sir. It won’t happen again.”

Senator Lightwood exhales heavily, rubbing his forehead. Jace has the feeling he’s made the Senator very tired, which he really is sorry for, but still thinks this is all an overreaction. “There are some things, Jace, that you are too young to understand. Things that Maryse and I - do you know the expression ‘blood will tell’?”

Jace shakes his head.

“It means there are some things that are in the blood. Sometimes a person can’t help being what they are. There are things we inherit from our fathers that we cannot change. Jace, I am asking you to overcome your blood. I am asking you, in return for the fact that we took you in, gave you a home, a life, the best education a child could hope for, an entire future - I am asking you to be more than Michael Wayland’s son. Do you understand what I’m saying?”

Jace nods. He doesn’t really understand, but the Senator doesn’t usually like to be asked questions and this seems like a particularly touchy subject.

“You know, I had my concerns. From the very beginning. When we found out you were still alive, after the fire, Maryse insisted we take you in.” Now he isn’t following at all, but the Senator seems to be talking more to himself than Jace at this point and he’s scared to interrupt. It’s also the closest either Maryse or Robert has ever come to giving him actual information about the relationship between their families, and he doesn’t intend to cut him off. “She said we owed it to your mother, after everything she had been through. I obviously had my concerns about bringing such an - unstable - element into our home, exposing our children to that. But you know I’ve never been able to say no to Maryse. I will ask you again, Jace - do not make me regret our generosity.”

“I understand, sir. I won’t.”

“Good. And maybe we can find something constructive for you to do with all that - “ he gestures vaguely at Jace. “Have you ever been to a boxing gym?”

“No, sir.”

“I’ll have Rosie arrange boxing lessons for you, alright?”

“Thank you, sir.”

“You’re dismissed.”

Jace nods, and tries to walk slowly out of the office, even though he wants to run. Why was he an ‘unstable element’? Did the Senator think Jace would ever hit Alec? Or Izzy, even? Did he think Jace couldn’t control himself? He wasn’t an animal. Jace feels the back of his neck burning. He steels himself in the hallway. He can hear his father’s voice in his head. _You have nothing to be ashamed of. You are a fighter, and a survivor, and a Wayland_. Jace pulls his shoulders back, standing up a little straighter. That’s when he sees Alec, sitting on the floor in the hallway, waiting for him.

“Are you in trouble?” Alec asks, jumping up.

“No. He wants me to take boxing lessons.”

Alec looks surprised. “I want to take boxing lessons.”

“Nah, you’re too busy with violin,” Jace teases.

“Dude, shut up, there’s nothing wrong with playing the violin.”

Jace throws his arm over Alec’s shoulder. “C’mon. We’ve got tons of homework.”

Alec groans, but allows Jace to lead him away. Jace looks back down the hallway, just as they turn the corner. Senator Lightwood is standing in the door of his office, watching them walk away arm in arm. Jace has no idea what the expression on his face means.

 

**Alec, 20**

The three of them are in Izzy’s room, waiting for her to finish putting on her makeup, which apparently takes about three hours despite the fact that as far as Alec could tell, she already had a full face of makeup on at dinner.

“C’mon Iz, we’re withering away here. It’s getting late,” Alec complains.

“It is ELEVEN PM, Alexander. Honestly, Jace, does he never go out with you at school?”

“He tries not to. I don’t let him get away with it though, don’t worry.”

“Good boy,” Izzy blows him a kiss in approval. “Besides, I’m almost ready. Alec, can you tell the pilot?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Oh come on. You didn’t think we were going out in _Maryland_. No. We’re going into the city.”

“DC?” asks Alec.

“No, silly. New York. I’ve arranged it all, don’t worry.”

Jace laughs, shaking his head in what is either exasperation or appreciation. Or both.

“Jesus Christ,” Alec sighs. “You know you don’t actually have to spend as much money as humanly possible at any given moment? You do know that, right?”

“Yes. But then who would make sure you two were remembering to have fun?” She pats Alec on the cheek. “Besides, poor Jace got put through it today with Father.”

Jace shifts suddenly, almost imperceptibly.

“Oh shit, J, I’m sorry - I meant from Robert, grilling you at dinner like that, about what you want to do this summer, and everything. I’m sorry -”

“What else would she have meant?” Alec demands. “What’s going on?”

“I -” Izzy starts, looking to Jace for approval.

“Izzy found an arrest report. For a man named Michael Wayland, in Nashville. From last week. She thought it might be my dad.”

“Jace, your dad is -” Alec is speaking so slowly he eventually just trails off into silence, trying to figure out at what point in the conversation they had slipped into an alternate plane of reality.

“I know that. That’s what I told Izzy. But she just wanted me to know what she had found.”

“Are you - are you okay?” Alec asks.

“Of course I’m okay. Why wouldn’t I be?”

Alec and Izzy exchange a look. A very clear _we will have a private conversation about this later_ look. Izzy sprays something on her hair with incredible flourish.

“Okay. I am done, and _now_ we are getting out of here. You ready, boys?”

“Lord. This is a tremendously irresponsible waste of fossil fuels,” sighs Alec, catching Jace’s eye and smiling at him. Jace smiles back, and for the moment at least, it seems like that’s all any of them will be saying on the subject of Michael Wayland.

*******

It’s incredibly loud in the club. Alec will never admit it to Izzy, but of course he’s having fun. They’re in the VIP room and everything is purple velvet and black leather and Alec is leaning back against a chaise lounge drinking straight from a bottle of champagne. Jace and Izzy are dancing, grinding together in the middle of the dance floor. The two of them are always happy to be the center of attention, but Alec needs to slip away occasionally, take a moment alone to recalibrate. He’s content watching them, so it takes him a second to realize that someone has slid into the armchair across from him.

“Hello. Who are you?” a man’s voice asks.

Alec looks up to see who’s joined him - he’s young, maybe a bit younger than Alec, with an outrageous amount of messy thick brown curls and piercing blue eyes. “Um. Alec?”

“Was that a question, Alec?” The boy leans across the table between them, putting his face close to Alec’s. Presumably so he can be heard over the music. Presumably.

“What - Who are you?” Alec demands, suddenly feeling hotly defensive, although he isn’t sure why.

“I’m Magnus Bane.” He extends a hand, bedecked with no less than four rings. “Why haven’t we met before?”

“Don’t know. Come here often?” Alec says. _Come here often? C’mon_. He immediately kicks himself. But the boy, Magnus, laughs.

“Actually, yes, I do. Which is why I’m wondering why I’ve never seen you before.”

“I go to Harvard. Just got out for the summer.”

“Mh, so you’re clever then, aren’t you?”

“Maybe.”

Alec isn’t sure what’s happening. He looks to the dance floor but can’t find Jace and Izzy anymore.

“Are you...here alone?” Magnus asks.

“My brother and sister are here. Somewhere.”

“Well maybe me and you should go. Somewhere.”

Alec laughs. “Is that so?”

Something is happening in the pit of his stomach. He’s nervous, yes, there’s a fluttery anxiety and touch of adrenaline. But it’s something else. Something deeper. A tightening feeling that says, somehow, _Oh. Finally. Finally we are here._

Over the pounding music, incongruously, someone is screaming. Alec looks around, confused, and sees four girls trying to push their way into the VIP room, literally fighting tooth and nail to get past the bouncers.

“Ah. Well. That’s my cue to leave.” Magnus stands. “Give me your phone.”

Alec is too surprised to do anything but oblige, and he watches Magnus put his phone number in.

“Who - are they - are they looking for you?”

Magnus winks, handing his phone back. “Call me.”

And then he’s gone.

Alec remembers when Jace was teaching him to box, and he’d accidentally drop kicked Alec flat on his back and knocked the wind out of him. That came pretty close to how Alec was feeling right now. Then, of course, Izzy descends.

“ALEXANDER LIGHTWOOD I CANNOT BELIEVE YOU!!!”

“What?”

Izzy all but climbs onto the chaise with him, shrieking. “Do not tell me you don’t know who you were just talking to.”

“Magnus Bane?”

“YES MAGNUS BANE!” Izzy smacks his arm, way harder than a girl her size has a right to.

“Jesus, what. Do you know him?”

“Hmm well let me think, he’s only one of the most famous people on the planet, so yeah, you could say that, Alec!”

“Oh. Shit. Wait. He’s not that one, from the band - “

“Little Things!!! Yes!!!! God!!!”

“Izzy, please stop yelling.”

“You have to introduce me.”

“No one is introducing anyone. In case you haven’t noticed, he left.” Alec is starting to get a headache.

“Yeah, but he gave you his number! I saw!” Izzy rounds on Alec anew. “Wait. Was it like - was he hitting on you?”

“Izzy - “

Now Izzy really does stop screaming. She grabs her brother’s hand. “Alec, that’s amazing. I’m - do you want to…?”

“I don’t know. I mean. I think I know, but -”

Izzy nods quickly. “One thing at a time, okay?”

Alec squeezes her hand and takes a deep breath, collecting himself. “What did you do to Jace? Should we get out of here?”

Izzy stands, pulling Alec up after her. She looks up at him, and then hugs him tightly, so quickly he barely has time to hug her back before she’s let go and migrated back to her normal speaking pitch. “I lost him to some Ballet Academy girls”

Alec rolls his eyes. “God help us all.”

Izzy pulls him towards the balcony, but it doesn’t take long to find Jace. He’s got a girl, presumably one of the aforementioned ballerinas, pressed up against the wall. Her hands are under his shirt, no doubt exploring the solid valleys of muscle built up over long years of training. He kisses her hungrily, and Alec finds himself watching with a detachment that’s almost clinical. Like maybe if he watches Jace do this for long enough, he can trick whatever switch it is in his brain that never got turned on properly into working. He can imitate the way Jace knots his hands through her long hair, pulling her head back a little until her lips break apart from his...Jace lets go of her. He’s noticed that he has an audience, Izzy standing there with her arms crossed, all but tapping her foot. Alec stands slightly behind her, and tries to muster a sheepish look for Jace’s benefit.

“I’m right in the middle of something,” Jace says.

“Time to go. It’s important.” Izzy overrules him.

Jace sighs heavily, and kisses the girl one more time. “Guess duty calls. Sorry.”

She’s a little breathless as she says, “That’s okay. I’ll give you my number.”

He pats her cheek. “That’s okay.”

And then he laughs and grabs Izzy and Alec and the three of them half-run out of there.

“You are a fucking asshole, Jace Wayland,” Izzy laughs.

It’s late, even by New York standards, and the streets are empty. The air is stinging, but it feels amazing to Alec as he struts through the streets with his siblings.

“Oh, no question,” Jace agrees. “So what’s the emergency?”

“There isn’t one. We just wanted to go home.” Izzy says.

“Are you kidding me? I was just - “ Jace launches into his lament, but it feels like he’s doing it for the sake of performance, not out of actual annoyance.

“Shut up. It doesn’t matter. The real news is that Alec met someone.”

“What! Nice, man! At the club?” Jace grabs Alec’s arm, a look of genuine excitement and happiness on his face.

“I don’t know if it was like that, you guys,” Alec says, trying to slow down whatever it is that’s happening right now.

“It was definitely like that. I saw. And he gave Alec his number!”

“He?” Jace asks. Now he’s actually grinning.

“Yeah.” Alec stops, suddenly tentative, looking into his brother’s face.

“Dude. That’s amazing. You have to call him.” Jace looks downright proud, which for some reason makes Alec want to burst into tears.

“Of _course_ he’s going to call him, because GUESS. WHO. IT. WAS?!!” Izzy is screeching again. How she sustains that pitch and intensity without losing her voice has always been a mystery to Alec. “It was MAGNUS BANE!”

“The singer from that boy band?” Jace asks.

“They are NOT a boy band.”

“Aren’t they a pop band with a bunch of boys who can’t play instruments?” says Jace.

“Ok well. Technically yes, but Little Things is not _just_ a boy band, they totally transcend the genre -”

“Sounds like a boy band to me,” agrees Alec. Izzy punches him in the arm again. “Jesus, Jace, why did you ever teach her to throw a punch?” he asks, rubbing his bicep. Izzy spares him a smirk, then continues preaching the gospel of Magnus Bane.

“He’s totally famous. Everyone is in love with him. Like actually everyone. And it’s, like, rumored that he’s bisexual, but it’s never been confirmed publicly. Although I guess that basically just happened, like, right in front of my eyes. Oh my god. The theory is that he was in love with his bandmate, and they had this whole super secret tragic relationship, but that’s also never been proven.”

“Sounds messy,” says Alec. “Maybe I’ll just - “

“Absolutely not. You are calling him,” Izzy says.

Jace nods. “You are.”

Alec thinks, suddenly, of the girl Jace had been kissing back at the club. At the way she had helped herself to his body, and the look of total abandon and vulnerability on Jace’s face when he kissed her. Alec deserved to be kissed like that too, didn’t he? “Ok. Fine. I’ll call him.”

Izzy screams and jumps up and down until Alec threatens to change his mind if she doesn’t shut up. And then Jace is lifting Izzy onto his back because her heels are killing her and they’re taking the long way back to the Lightwood’s penthouse in the city. And Izzy is demanding a detour for a pint of Ben and Jerry’s and Jace is scream-singing _Living on a Prayer_ with a truly disturbing disregard for the original lyrics, and Alec feels like something has shifted inside of him; something subtle, yes, but something real. And whatever it was, he definitely likes being on this side of it more.

 

**Jace, 20**

Jace leans his head back against the wall, trying to will the nausea from his body.

“Are you going to eat that?” asks Izzy, looking intently at Jace’s unfinished bagel.

“Help yourself.”

She pounces on the bagel. Jace takes a sip of coffee to avoid looking at Izzy. Her concerned expression is more than he can stand at the moment. “Ok, Alec, refocus,” she says.

“I’m trying!” Alec protests.

They’re in the deli on the corner down from the New York apartment. Izzy and Alec have spent all of breakfast workshopping a text to Magnus. Jace chimes in occasionally, mostly hoping it will make Izzy stop looking at him like that.

Whatever he felt yesterday about Izzy’s revelation had been dulled by the excitement of their reunion, and then by a significant number of gin and tonics. But it hit him this morning along with the hangover; a sick, certain feeling in his chest that there was more to the story of his father’s death than he knew. He still wasn’t convinced that the Michael Wayland Izzy had found was his Michael Wayland. He knew his father was dead. _You never saw the body_ , a small voice in the back of his mind whispers, tauntingly seductive. _They put an empty casket in the ground. Yeah, because he fucking burned to death_ , he snaps back at his own brain. He knows what he’s doing. He’s letting himself hope for something that cannot be real. And when it turns out to be just some random drug dealer low life who happens to be named Michael, it’s going to feel like losing his father all over again. Jace doesn’t believe in chasing fantasies. Reality sucked, but reality was what he had. And people either learned how to deal with it or they didn’t. Jace had always prided himself on being someone who knew how to cope. You accept the hand you’re dealt. Jace had been lucky, he knew that, being dealt a second hand when the Lightwoods adopted him. But he didn’t delude himself into thinking there was anything special about him. He didn’t deserve the life they had given him. He had been plucked up, _deus ex machina_ style, on his way into the foster system. Saved by some tenuous connection between Maryse and a mother he couldn't remember.

When Jace was a child, he had told his father he wanted to be a doctor. He liked the idea of being able to help people, of people coming to him in need. It had been during one of their “down and out” years. They’d been living in Kentucky, in some housing project with a girl named Val. She was a stripper, and sometimes when no one could find Michael she would take Jace to work with her and leave him in the back room while she danced. The girls always took care of him, making sure he did his homework, and when Val got off her shift she would take him to McDonald’s and let him order as much as he wanted. He had liked Val. He wondered what had happened to her. Anyway, during the Kentucky year, when Jace must have been seven or eight, he had told Michael that he wanted to be a doctor. Michael had laughed at him, and said, _some people are handed a whole life. They’re the ones who get to be doctors n’ shit. The rest of us have to fight just to stay alive. Dreams distract you. Dreams get you killed_.

Small Jace had nodded solemnly, not sure what to make of that. But now he understood. Dreams were for people like Alec, and Izzy. People who had always had the luxury of guaranteed survival, so there was plenty of free time to think about becoming something in the world, making a difference and all that. Robert had always accused Jace of lacking ambition. But Jace did have ambition. His ambition, from about age four on, had been to stay alive. And then when he was eleven the rules of the game had changed overnight and he had spent the following nine years trying to find his footing.

“You doing okay over there?” Izzy asks, and Jace realizes he’s been staring off over her shoulder for awhile now.

“Hungover,” Jace grunts.

Alec laughs. “You losing your touch, J? You used to be invincible.”

“You’re both getting old,” Izzy says helpfully.

“Are we going back to Bethesda today?” Jace asks.

Izzy shrugs. “Whatever you want. We can take the car.”

Jace nods. He can’t stand the look of pity on Izzy’s face. She knows what he’s upset about, and she’s kicking herself for telling him. He forces himself to rally, to do his well practiced Jace Lightwood impression, the one he does at campaign stops and parties and Harvard office hours. “Okay, where are we with the text to Magnus?” he asks, with a cheeriness he doesn’t feel.

“So far I have ‘Hey. It’s Alec, from last night.’” Alec reads off his phone.

“You’ve been working on that for an _hour_ ,” Jace says.

“Oh well if it’s all so easy why don’t you contribute something,” says Alec.

Jace grabs the phone.

“Hey!” Alec protests, trying to snatch the phone back.

Jace narrates as he types quickly. “‘It’s Alec. Haven’t stopped thinking about you since last night. When are we getting drinks?’”

“No!” Alec jumps over to Jace’s side of the booth, slapping impotently at his brother.

“Boys please, this is not how we behave in public,” Izzy scolds them in a sing-song tone that’s a dead-on imitation of their mother.

“Too late. It’s sent.” Jace says, handing back the phone.

“Jace!!!”

“Dude, some trust please. I know what I’m about.”

“True, if we’re going off sheer sluttiness, Jace is definitely the most qualified,” says Izzy.

"Thanks, Iz.”

“Oh my god he's calling me?!?!” Alec almost drops his phone. “What do I do!?”

“Answer it?” suggests Jace.

“Calling! What are you, married??” says Izzy.

"I don’t know! That’s so weird, right? Who calls!”

“Oh my god, answer the phone, Alec!” screams Izzy.

“Everyone shut up.”

“You’re the one yelling,” Jace reminds him.

“Hello?” says Alec into the phone.

Izzy _shhhhs_ them dramatically.

“I’m still not talking!” whispers Jace.

“Yeah, hey.” Alec says. “No, I’m not busy. I’m glad you called.” He sounds so happy it breaks Jace’s heart a little bit. Jace figured out Alec was gay when they were about fifteen, but he was never sure if Alec knew. And despite their closeness, despite the openness with which Jace discussed sex and dating and his (countless) misadventures with women, Alec never broached the topic in relation to his own life. It was a closed door, and Jace never knocked on it. It was an open secret between the three of them. No one ever said it out loud, but they were united in their understanding, and Jace and Izzy were united in their determination to shield Alec from whatever blowback the world had in store for him.

“Tonight? Yeah, I’m still in the city.” Alec says, laughing a little. Izzy slaps Jace with what is apparently enthusiasm but feels a lot like wrath. “Yeah, that sounds great. I’m intrigued,” Alec smiles. “You’ll text me the address?” Jace decides he is fully prepared to murder this boy band kid if he fucks with Alec’s head. “Okay. I’ll talk to you later, bye.” Alec hangs up, gripping his phone tightly.

“Well!?!” demands Izzy.

“He asked me to have dinner with him tonight. We’re going on a date.”

Izzy squeals, throwing her arms around Alec. “That’s amazing, Al! I’m so happy for you.”

“Where’s he taking you?” Jace asks.

“He said it was a surprise.”

“Cuteeeeee,” Jace teases. “Congrats, dude.”

Alec laughs. “Thanks, guys.”

“Also, waiting for my ‘wow Jace, thank you so much for writing that text and I will never doubt you in matters of seduction again’,” says Jace.

“Yeah sure. What you said. All that,” agrees Alec. “Do you guys mind staying in the city another day? Or you can go home and I’ll meet you -”

“Of course we’ll stay,” Izzy says. “Right, Jace?”

Jace shrugs. “Unlike some people I don’t have a fancy internship to rush off to.”

“Perfect,” Izzy says.

“Oh my god. This is crazy. Is this crazy?” Alec is starting to panic.

Izzy soothes her brother, and Jace contributes the occasional affirmative “mmh” or “yep” as they head back to the penthouse. He wants to be alone, to be able to go into his room and shut the door and finally succumb to the desire that has been mounting steadily since Izzy first spoke Michael’s name yesterday. He needs to look for himself. He’s not sure what he thinks he will find, but he has to look. _Nothing_ , he scolds himself. _You will find nothing_.

*******

Jace has been staring at the same screen on his laptop for the past twenty minutes. He’s alone in the Upper West Side apartment. Izzy took Alec shopping, claiming he absolutely needed a new outfit for his date tonight if he was really going out with Magnus Bane, boybander and fashion icon extraordinaire. For once Alec had willingly submitted to a shopping expedition with his sister. Poor kid. He must really be nervous.

Which leaves Jace alone sitting in front of the laptop that lives in this apartment. One of the strangest things about being a Lightwood was the sheer superfluousness of their lives. Multiple houses, multiple computers, multiple cars. He’s pretty sure Izzy has a complete wardrobe in three different cities, just in case. Just because she can. He’s never really been able to get use to it, and Alec and Izzy, born into it and therefore blinded by it, were never really able to see the absurdity of living with so much more than you needed. He leans back in his chair and opens a new tab. “Bethesda to Nashville drive time” he types. It’s ten hours. He could take the helicopter. No he couldn’t. He wasn’t going anywhere, he was being stupid. He closes the tab, which of course returns him to the screen that immobilized him twenty minutes ago.

Unlike Izzy, Jace didn’t find his father in the crime blotter. He found him in The Tennessean, the number one local news source for Nashville, apparently. It was a small piece, detailing the opening of a halfway house for at-risk teens. There was a photo from the center’s ribbon cutting, showing the three benefactors standing in suits, arms around each other, smiling broadly. Shaking hands with the Mayor. And there in full, high resolution, unmistakable color, was his father. His father was alive. His father was alive, and had never come for him. Maybe he thought Jace was dead, the way Jace had thought Michael dead. Maybe he didn’t want Jace. His father was alive. Maryse and Robert. They must know. They must have known they were taking the son of a living man, lying to him. Their betrayal hits him like a wave of ice cold water, and for a second he thinks he’ll drown in it.

Stop it, he tells himself. _Take a breath, check your feet, keep your head up_. Coach Gamble had beaten the mantra into him, the correct way to respond to a rough hit. It was so deeply ingrained as a comforting touchstone that he returned to it even when he wasn’t in the ring. _Take a breath, check your feet, keep your head up_. He needed more information. He currently knew that 1) his father, Michael Wayland, was still alive 2) Michael Wayland was in Nashville 3) Michael was either a criminal or an upstanding community leader, depending on which of the articles you chose to believe (both? maybe?). That simply wasn’t enough to go on. He had always teased Alec about his penchant for list-making; to-do lists, pro and con lists, grocery lists. Jace’s idea of grocery shopping was to wait until he was starving, storm into the nearest store, and then purchase whatever he could put into his body quickest. But now he clung to his list of facts. _One thing at a time_ , he warns his brain. Maybe there was some mistake. Maybe the whole thing was a terrible misunderstanding. Maybe he was never meant to know. Wasn’t he happy, being a Lightwood? Maryse and Robert had been nothing but kind to him, and Alec and Izzy, well...before he met them, he wouldn’t have even thought to dream of having people like that in his life. He didn’t know those kind of people existed.

He feels stupid, somehow, for not doing this before. But why would he have scoured the internet for a man he knew to be dead? Google had returned quite a few results for “Michael Wayland”. He never would have found him without the Nashville detail from Izzy. There was a realtor named Michael Wayland in Detroit, for example, who seemed lovely, but certainly wasn’t his father.

He had searched, as a teenager, for any coverage of the house fire that had killed his father and bought him to the Lightwoods. There was no record of it. It had surprised him; he figured there’d be at least some local news item, some write-up on the death. But it was as if it had never happened. Jace chokes on the memory of smoke, hears the screaming again. The screaming he had always thought came from his dying father. The fire had happened, Jace knew that. He couldn’t start doubting his own mind. The only mentions of the Wayland family in connection with a fire were the few pieces on Senator Lightwood which mentioned that he had adopted a son, an orphan who had lost his entire family in a fire. None of them mentioned Michael by name. Alec had suggested, when Jace broached the issue once during their teen years, that perhaps apartments burning down in Brooklyn were so commonplace at the time that nobody had bothered to report on it. Jace had accepted that explanation, but in retrospect he wonders if he had accepted it because the threat of having to look this thing straight in the face was too daunting. Oh God. Did Alec know? Had Alec lied to him, too? Jace snaps his computer shut. No. That was impossible. Alec and Izzy were just as in the dark as him. Maryse and Robert, sure; he could conceive of a world where they lied to him about who he was. But not Alec. Not Izzy. Never Alec.

He hears the ding of the elevator and then the undeniable sound of Lightwood sibling bickering from the foyer. They’re home. He checks his phone and realizes it’s already late afternoon. Alec doesn’t need to hear about this right now. He has enough on his mind. Jace gives himself five more seconds of stomach-churning turmoil, and then puts his Lightwood mask back on and goes to find his brother and sister.

“Oh thank _God_ you’re here, J,” Izzy says as he enters the bedroom. She’s fussing over the fourteen shopping bags dumped haphazardly on the bed. “Alec’s in the shower. Just between you and me, he’s being an absolute baby about this.”

“What did you do to him?” Jace asks.

“Nothing! Nothing at all! Okay so maybe I made him get his chest waxed, but honestly, he’s going to thank me when Magnus gets that shirt off and sees the goods.”

Jace laughs, and Izzy finally stops sorting through the mountain of clothes.

“What’ve you been up to?” she asks.

“Went for a run. Applied for some summer jobs.”

“You know you just have to ask Father, right? He’ll find you something.”

“I know.”

Izzy shrugs and turns her attention back to the clothes, presenting two leather jackets to Jace. “Which do you like better? We couldn’t decide.”

“One on the left,’ Jace says. “Cause I want the other for myself.”

“Hold up,” Alec says. He exits the bathroom, tousling his damp hair, a towel around his waist. “Those are both mine.”

“Looking good, Al,” says Jace, nodding at his brother. “Like the manscaping.”

“Is it too much?” He sounds panicked and rounds on Izzy. “I told you it was too much!”

“No, no.” Jace laughs. “It’s great. You’re gonna knock ‘em dead.”

Alec pulls on a pair of underwear and drops his towel.

“I thought you were going to wear the Calvins,” Izzy reprimands.

“It doesn’t matter what underwear I wear. Because everyone’s clothes are going to stay on. We’re just having dinner. I’m not even totally sure it’s a date. Okay?” Alec says, his voice definitely edging into panic.

“I know, I know,” Izzy agrees. “We’re just teasing, Al. We know it’s just a dinner.”

“I just don’t think we should assume he wants to have sex with me!’ Alec says, defensively.

“Nobody’s assuming anything. Just go have dinner with him and see how it feels, okay?” Jace says.

Alec nods.

“But do listen to the lady and go with the Calvins,” Jace suggests.

“Thank God one of you pays attention to me,” Izzy says.

Alec dutifully changes into a nicer pair of underwear. “Am I allowed to get dressed now?” he asks.

“Honestly, please,” Izzy says, ripping the tags from a pair of jeans and tossing them to Alec. “I still need to do your hair.”

“It’s a date, not the prom, Iz,” Jace reminds her, worried that Izzy is making this feel too high stakes for Alec.

“As the person in this room who spends the most time on their hair every morning, you are absolutely barred from making any snide comments right now,” Izzy says.

“Wow. Savage. You’re not going to defend me?” Jace asks Alec.

“Can’t argue with facts, brother,” says Alec, laughing.

Satisfied that Alec at least isn’t panicking anymore, Jace flops down on the bed and watches him finish getting ready. Objectively, Alec really is quite attractive. He’s always been a head taller than Jace, his body tight and lean where Jace is muscled and stocky. And those dark curls and thick eyebrows certainly helped, face-wise. He was a good looking kid. Girls tripped after him at school, and Alec’s complete oblivion to their advances would have been enough to convince Jace he was gay even if Jace hadn’t already known. He tired to remember exactly when it had first occurred to him that Alec was gay. But there had been no lightning strike of recognition, no declaration. It had just entered their collective subconscious, little by little. He wondered how Maryse and Robert would react. They had to know as well, didn’t they? Jace realizes he’s making a fist just speculating about a potential negative reaction and has to force himself to relax his grip.

As if he had heard Jace’s thoughts, Alec asks, “Did you tell Mother and Father we were staying in the city?”

“I called Rosie. Mother went with the Senator into DC for the week, so we’re fine there,” Izzy says, rubbing some product through Alec’s hair so his bangs fall with the illusion of carelessness across his forehead.

“What a lengthy family reunion that was,” Jace jokes.

“In their defense, we took off first,” Alec says.

Jace says nothing, not feeling particularly inclined to be generous to Maryse and Robert at the moment.

“Okay. I think you’re ready.” Izzy says.

Alec turns to Jace, presenting himself for inspection. “What do you think?” he asks.

Jace smiles at him. “I think you’re perfect.”

 

**Alec, 20**

Alec is nervous. Okay, so that’s an understatement. Alec is lightly considering throwing up. He’s waiting outside the restaurant, some terribly exclusive sushi place that doesn’t even have a sign (or a name?). Magnus had texted to say he was running a few minutes late but would see him soon. Should he sit down? Or stay standing up? He should stand up. He could lean against the building a bit. That seemed casual, like he did this all the time. Or did it seem like he was _trying_ to be casual?! Shit. He tries to remember how Jace usually stands when he’s talking to girls. Of course, it doesn’t really matter what Jace does; girls (as well as a few enterprising boys) generally lined up to throw themselves at him. Jace was popular because, in addition to his general Jace-ness, people perceived that it made no difference to him if they liked him or not. The mere fact that he couldn’t care less what you thought of him seemed to entice people. Things didn’t come quite so easily to Alec. As much as he wished he could be like Jace, he had always cared deeply what people thought of him, if they liked him, if they wanted him around, if he was good enough.

Maybe if he cared less about that kind of thing he would have dated more by this point. And then he wouldn’t be so nervous waiting for Magnus. No, he would probably still be this nervous. Alec had done a very perfunctory google search for Magnus Bane this morning and had immediately gotten so overwhelmed he’d had to spend 45 minutes pacing the balcony while Jace tried to talk him down.

A black SUV pulls up in front of the restaurant, and Magnus climbs out the back. He’s wearing a black velvet blazer, and his face breaks into a wide smile when he sees Alec.

“Hey,” Magnus says, and he embraces Alec. His easy charm is intoxicating, and Alec smiles back. “Sorry I’m late.”

“No worries.”

Magnus holds the door open for him, then follows him into the restaurant. They’re seated right away at a private table upstairs, and the waitress immediately produces a bottle of sake. “On the house,” she says, winking at Magnus.

As she walks away, Alec laughs a little. “Do you usually get handed bottles of sake wherever you go?”

“Oh, absolutely. It’s a key component of all my contracts.” Magnus pours sake for him and Alec and raises his glass.

“To sake,” Magnus says.

Alec toasts him. “To well-written contracts.”

“So you’ve figured out how I am, then?”

Alec blushes. “My sister set me straight - well, not straight -”

Magnus laughs and raises his glass again. “I’ll drink to that.”

“But yes. She told me. And then I did some light googling.”

“Lord. Please don’t tell me what you found.”

“Only good things,” Alec says.

“Oh, you and I both know that’s not true,” Magnus smiles. “But I googled you too. A Senator’s son, hmm?”

“Oh yes, just as thrilling as being a world famous rock star.”

Magnus laughs. “Trust me, it’s not nearly as much fun as it sounds. I spent most of the past four years in hotel rooms. And the decorating scheme of those places really starts to wear on you.”

“Do you miss it?”

“I miss playing the shows themselves. But touring?” Magnus makes a face. “Sleeping on a bus with four other guys gets - ”

“Cramped?” Alec suggests.

“- smelly, actually,” says Magnus, laughing. “But really, I’m not interesting. Tell me about yourself, Alexander Lightwood.”

Alec smiles. “Actually, you may be the most interesting person I’ve ever met. What do you possibly want to know about me?”

“Tell me about college. I always wished I had gotten to go.”

“It’s not too late,” says Alec.

“I didn’t even finish high school, I don’t think Harvard would take me.”

“Yeah but you’ve traveled the world, you’ve had these - these insane experiences, almost no one else has. There are more important things than high school, or Harvard.”

Magnus smiles. “Thank you, Alexander.”

“You know you can call me Alec, right? Everyone does.”

“I like Alexander. A man like you deserves a full name.”

Alec blushes, and he knows Magnus sees it. Magnus takes his hand across the table. Alec blushes even harder.

“C’mon. Tell me what you like most about school.”

So Alec does. Alec tells him about his Constitutional Ethics class, about wanting to go to Harvard Law next year and then become the DA and eventually Attorney General. He tells him about his father, who loomed so large but was gone so often. He tells him about Jace and Izzy. And by the time their food comes Alec has forgotten to be nervous, because Magnus keeps him talking and he’s leaning across the table like he thinks every word Alec says is the most interesting thing he’s ever heard. There’s something magnetic about Magnus; he reminds him of Jace in a way, that easy charm and alluring smile, like he’s got a secret and you’re the only one he wants to tell.

Once he’s full of sake and sashimi and the check comes, Magnus grabs it before Alec can.

“C’mon, let me split it with you at least,” Alec protests.

“No way.” Magnus throws down $400 and stands up. “Ready?”

Under the stack of hundreds, Alec sees the bill is only for $260. He smiles.

“Where are we going?” Alec asks.

“Friend of mine has an art gallery around the corner. Want to check it out?”

Alec genuinely does, but he also has a feeling he would say yes to anything Magnus suggested right now.

*******

Magnus’s “friend” turns out to be Julian Schnabel, which kind of just seems like the norm with Magnus. Julian’s gallery is opening an installation, showcasing some new talent, so there’s a party, a crowd of people who all seem to know Magnus. They make the rounds, Magnus more than once introducing Alec as his date, and Alec feels himself puff up with pride every time.

At some point Julian presses Magnus off to his office to look at a painting he wants Magnus to buy, leaving Alec to fend for himself. Which is going fine until he’s taken hostage by the artist, who launches into a monologue Alec is too polite to interrupt.

“Each installation is born from a repetitive process of photographing and rephotographing, so the work expands outward until it collapses into an abstraction, marooning the viewer upon the very ground on which he stands,” the artist (Emmitt? Emile?) is telling him. He feels Magnus come up behind him, slipping his hand under Alec’s jacket and resting it on his back. Alec’s stomach drops.

“Emilio, my love” Magnus says sweetly, “can I borrow Alexander for a moment?”

“Oh - alright,” Emilio says disappointedly as Magnus steers Alec away.

“I am so sorry,” Magnus whispers under his breath.

“You really fed me to the wolves there,” Alec laughs.

“Can I make it up to you?” Magnus opens his blazer to reveal a bottle of champagne, pilfered from the gallery bar, presumably.

“Definitely,” says Alec.

They take the fire escape up to the roof and sit, feet dangling precariously over the edge, looking out at the city, passing the bottle of champagne back and forth between them. It’s a stupidly beautiful night, not deep enough into summer for humidity, and Magnus is laughing and Alec is drunk on the sheer unbelievability of the moment. They’re close together, thighs and shoulders touching, and then Alec feels Magnus’s eyes on him so he turns to look and his mouth is right there and for once in his life Alec doesn’t think, doesn’t overanalyze, he just does exactly what he wants. He kisses Magnus. Magnus responds hungrily, grabbing the back of Alec’s head, fingers closing tightly in his hair, kissing him back. Alec feels the kiss through his whole body, like a jolt of electric energy. He puts his hand to the side of Magnus’s face, the way he’s seen Jace do, feeling Magnus’s skin under his thumb. Magnus seems to like it, because he sighs against Alec’s lips and kisses him harder, more urgently, pushing him back away from the ledge so they both fall onto the roof. They’re both giggling, catching their breath, and then Magnus rolls on top of Alec and he’s kissing him again, and Alec can’t believe this is really happening. That he’s here, that he can hold this boy’s face in his hands, that he can kiss him, that he _wants_ to be kissed by Alec. That he was right, he was ok, he knew who he was.

They kiss on the roof as the night settles deeper around them, and finally Magnus pulls away, flipping his long hair back from his eyes. Alec panics suddenly. Should he have made a move to go further yet? He’d been so caught up in the moment with Magnus that he’d forgotten to be anxious about what might come next. But Magnus says nothing, and instead just burrows his head into Alec’s chest, curling up around him and letting a comfortable silence fall over them.

“I like you, Alexander,” he says, finally.

“I like you, too,” Alec smiles.

And they stay like that, watching the stars, until the gallery has to close for the night and an unimpressed security guard throws them out.

 

**Jace, 16**

Jace is bleeding from at least three places. He hasn’t stopped to count properly, but he feels confident that it’s at least three. He can’t figure out how he’s going to get back into his room without bleeding all over Maryse’s Persian rugs.

Fuck. His head really hurts. Is he bleeding from the head, too? That can’t be good. The front door is definitely out. It’s been raining steadily all night, which is great because in addition to bleeding everywhere Jace is also sopping wet. He heads around the back, towards the wing where his and Alec’s rooms are, slipping a little on the muddy ground. He tries to focus up for a moment to count windows. Two up, four over. Fuck. He’s left all his windows shut. Ok, so - two up, three over. One of Alec’s windows is cracked open, thank God. Jace takes a deep breath, forcing his mind to ignore the pain, the way Coach Gamble always tells him to. _Your body is more powerful than your mind_ , Gamble would say when he was bleeding in the ring. _You can choose not to feel pain_. Bracing himself, Jace prepares to climb the tree that stretches between their bedrooms. His ears are still ringing and he almost falls the moment he jumps for a branch. He tries again; it’s slow going, but finally he makes it up to the window.

“Alec,” he hisses. “Hey! Alec! Wake up!” Alec’s sleeping form doesn’t move. Of course. Alec sleeps like he’s dead to the fucking world. Jace shifts his weight and extends a hand to push the screen in, tearing it a little at the bottom. Well. Maryse won’t like that.

Jace half climbs, half flings himself through Alec’s window, crashing to the ground in a soaking, muddy, bloody mess.

Alec screams.

“Shut up, shut up, it’s me!” Jace says.

Alec turns on a light, looking groggily from Jace to the window and then back to Jace. “What the fuck?” he finally musters, in a half-whisper.

“Got in a fight,” he says.

“Jesus.” Alec has jumped out of bed and is fussing over him. “Oh my god, Jace, you’re really bleeding. Here, come sit down on the bed.”

“I’m too wet,” Jace argues. Everything’s starting to get kind of foggy. Ugh. He really doesn’t want to faint.

“Shut up.” Alec drags him over to the bed and pulls Jace’s shirt over his head. Jace lets him push him down on his back.

“What the fuck happened, J?” Alec demands.

“I got jumped. Some guys behind AJ’s Bar. They thought I was making fun of them. Or something.”

“Were you!?”

Alec is touching his chest, using Jace’s discarded shirt to mop up the mess. Alec’s fingers are brushing his skin, and now Jace is pretty sure he is bleeding from the head, because his skin feels hot under Alec’s fingers, like he’s pulling a current of electricity straight out of Jace.

“I mean. Yeah.”

Alec pushes Jace’s wet hair out of his face, running his thumb down his cheek. “You’re such an idiot.” Alec touches his forehead to Jace’s. And now Jace is sure he’s going to pass out because he feels like the bed is spinning under him. “We need to take you to the hospital, Jace,” Alec says, voice cracking a little. Jace can feel Alec’s breath on his face, which isn’t necessarily helping the room spin less?

“We can’t. Your dad. Would look really bad.”

Alec exhales in frustration. “Okay. I’m gonna get Izzy. She’ll know what to do.”

Jace nods. He grabs Alec’s hand, trying to say thank you, but he just sort of grunts and flops back down. He hasn’t even fully realized Alec is gone before he’s already back with Izzy, who quickly takes stock of the situation.

“The big cut is on his head,” he hears Alec telling her. “I think it needs stitches. And then there’s more - both of his hands, and his ribs, right here.”

“Jesus. Is this broken?” Izzy says, prodding his ribs, which certainly feel broken based on the lightning spasm of pain he experiences under Izzy’s touch.

“I have no idea,” Alec says, his voice tight.

“Ok,” says Izzy. “Ok. Alec, go to the bathroom and get the first aid kit, and then go to my room and get my sewing kit. I can do stitches.”

He hears Alec run out of the room. Izzy sits down on the bed next to him. “Lay on your stomach.” He does what he’s told. She pulls his head into her lap, pressing the shirt onto his open wound to stop the bleeding. “Jace, why?” she sounds desperate. “What happened?”

He tries to answer, but his face his pressed into Izzy’s leg and his voice comes out muffled and hoarse.

“What?”

He pulls his head back a little. “Tried to beat up Devon Travers.”

“The captain of the basketball team? The six foot three senior? _That_ Devon Travers? _Why_?!”

“Called Alec fag.”

He feels Izzy’s body stiffen, frozen for a moment in tight anger. And then she exhales. “Did you tell Alec?”

“Course not.”

Izzy kisses Jace’s hair, sighing heavily. “What am I going to do with you two?”

“You love us,” Jace says sleepily.

“Hey. No sleeping. You probably have a concussion.”

“S’a myth.”

“What are you, a doctor?”

“You’re 14.”

He feels Izzy shrug. Then she asks, “Devon Travers did this to you all by himself?”

Jace tries to shake his head, but stops when the room starts to spin again. “Whole team was there.”

“You jumped the entire Varsity basketball team by yourself??”

“S’not my best plan,” Jace agrees.

Alec slips back into the room, locking the door behind him. The Lightwood siblings have a fairly spirited discussion above him, but Jace decides he doesn’t need to follow it. Then they’re swabbing something that stings on his head.

“Thank God they made me learn needlepoint, I guess,” says Izzy.

“Are you _sure_ you should be doing this?” Alec says.

“Obviously I’m not sure Alec! Stop asking me that. Jace, this is going to hurt.”

It does hurt, but he feels the pain in a detached way, like it isn’t actually happening to him in this moment, but perhaps had happened to him a long time ago, or was happening to someone he knew. He can feel the prick of the needle, and a nauseating pulling sensation, but mostly he feels Alec holding his head steady, and the light touches of Izzy’s fingers as she stitches him up.

“Put more iodine on,” Alec instructs.

He feels a terrible tug that resonates deep in his stomach and almost makes him vomit but he hopes that means it’s over, and he exhales. They swab at it again and then they each take an arm and heave him towards the headboard, so he’s laying on his side, head on a pillow.

“More comfortable?” Izzy asks.

“Not really.” says Jace.

They do some more swabbing and wrapping, but Izzy seems to be done with the stabbing, so things are looking considerably up.

“I don’t think we can do anything about a broken rib, can we?” Izzy asks.

“No,” says Jace. “Just leave it. Will heal.”

“What if it punctures his lung or something? That happens,” Alec says.

“I’d be dead already.” Jace says.

Alec lets out a strangled sort of laugh which suggests he doesn’t actually find this whole thing at all funny.

“Ok,” Izzy says. “Take all this back Al, and get him a glass of water.”

Alec rushes back out, and even in his semi-delirious state, Jace considers it a testament to how worried Alec must be that he doesn’t even object to Izzy bossing him around. Izzy pulls off Jace’s jeans and tucks him into Alec’s bed, smoothing blankets over him.She strokes his hair back. “I’m so sorry, J. I know it hurts.” The whole thing feels so crushingly maternal that Jace feels tears stinging his eyes. He can’t remember ever being tucked into bed before.

“You can’t fight all Alec’s battles for him, you know.”

“Not his battle. He’s my brother. S’my battle,” Jace tries to explain.

Izzy sighs. “Tell me you at least got a few good hits in on that piece of shit.”

“Broke his nose,” Jace confirms.

“That’s my boy.”

And then Alec returns with the water and they make him take a few sips before he’s allowed to lay down again. Izzy crawls in on his right and Alec curls up around him on his left, and he’s falling asleep listening to them discuss what to do with the bloody, muddy sheets in the morning when he’s struck by the need to tell them, to explain the whole thing, the profound gratitude he feels for their caretaking, for the intensity of their loyalty, for their bodies keeping him safe and rooted down to earth. But it’s too big so he just mutters “thank you” into the pillow and is asleep before he’s fully closed his mouth.

 

**Alec, 20**

When Alec comes into the kitchen the next morning, back in Bethesda, Jace and Izzy are sitting together on a bench, both looking deadly serious. Jace is eating a plate of, at minimum, ten scrambled eggs with an intensity generally reserved for rocket scientists, while Izzy primly sips her coffee.

“Uh. Good morning?” Alec says.

Izzy jumps. “Alec! Sit down. We made you breakfast.”

Alec slides onto the bench opposite them. He’s always loved being in the kitchen, usually because it meant it was just the three of them, gathered around that old wooden table with the benches built into the wall. It was one of the rooms in the estate that felt most like home.

He looks from Jace to Izzy, suspicious. “What’s going on?”

‘“Eat.” Izzy gets up and grabs a plate, then places an enormous stack of pancakes in front of him. “You love pancakes.”

“Okay, seriously, what did you two do? Did you break something?”

Jace finally puts his fork down. “Alec. We love you. This is an intervention.”

Izzy drops back into her seat next to Jace. “It’s a sextervention.”

Jace sighs. “We agreed we were _not_ calling it a sextervention.”

“I never agreed to that,” Izzy says.

“Um! Hi! Excuse me,” interrupts Alec. “A what now?”

Jace gestures at him with his coffee mug. “Listen. It seems like you and Magnus are, you know, pretty into each other, and we just want to make sure you’re ready, just in case -”

“Oh my God are you guys trying to give me a sex talk?!”

“A sextervention.” Izzy clarifies. “But yes. Oh, come on Alec, we all know you’re a virgin.”

“Okay. I’m leaving. This has been great, though, thanks.”

“Ignore Izzy - “

“Rude.”

Jace starts again. “Ignore Izzy. The point is, we just figured we’d put it out there, if you want to ask us any questions or whatever, you know. We got you.”

Izzy launches right back in. “You know you have to use a condom right? STDs - “

“Listen, I appreciate the sentiment but I really don’t need to have this conversation with my little sister.”

“Yeah, in retrospect maybe this is one I should have taken alone, Iz,” says Jace.

“I’m here to provide a woman’s perspective!”

“There’s not going to be any women involved!” Alec retorts.

Izzy laughs. “Okay, well, of the three people at this table, I’m the only one who’s ever actually fucked a man. Unless there’s something Jace isn’t telling us. So I happen to think my perspective is invaluable.”

“Well, she makes a good point there,” says Jace.

Alec shakes his head, resignedly digging into his pancakes. He chews for a moment, contemplating the two of them. He had always been baffled when kids at school spoke of their siblings with jealousy and anger and dislike, or worse, in his mind - indifference. He and Izzy and Jace had always moved as one entity. The three headed monster, Rosie used to call them. There was nothing between them in the way of self-consciousness, or boundaries. They could see each other without their skin on. He sighs. “Okay, fine. I do have a question.”

Izzy genuinely does a little fist pump. Jace catches Alec’s eye, nodding at him to go on. “I’m just worried - how do you know like. The order. To do things in. Like when do you make a move, or you know, go into a new thing…” he trails off, trying to signal for help to Jace.

“You just do what feels right in the moment,” Jace says. “There’s no timeline you’re supposed to stick to.”

“If you want to do something beyond what you’re doing, just suggest it. And let him tell you what he wants,” Izzy adds.

“Yeah. And tell him what you’re into. Like, if he’s doing something that feels really good, tell him.”

“And you can always stop or slow things down. That’s important. You should feel safe with him.”

“I think I do. I mean,” Alec says slowly, “we don’t know each other that well, but it felt - “

“You likeeeee him!” Izzy squeals.

Alec rolls his eyes.

“I’m really happy for you, man,” says Jace.

“Also, the sex is going to be like, way better. If you’re really connected to each other. You know, if you really feel something for him. You’re going to love it,” adds Izzy.

“I don’t think that’s true. For guys, I mean,” says Jace.

Izzy looks at him, seeming genuinely surprised. “You don’t think guys care about being connected to their partner?”

“No, of course I care. I dunno. I just, don’t think I necessarily feel anything special, like, if there’s emotions or not or whatever. It’s just sex.”

“Well, maybe you’re not having sex with the right people,” Izzy suggests.

“Not for lack of trying - what are you at now Jace, 80% of the female student body?” asks Alec.

Jace shakes his head. “I’m sorry, who’s supposed to be getting sexterventioned right now?”

“Good point. We’ll circle back to you.” Izzy rounds on Alec. “The point is, just do what feels right. The most important thing is that you’re confident and comfortable. Everything else will come after.”

“What if,” Alec gets quiet. “What if he thinks it’s weird that I haven’t had sex before?”

“Then fuck him,” says Jace, deadly serious now. “I mean. Don’t fuck him. He can go fuck himself. That’s not something he gets to have an opinion on.”

“Do you guys think I’m weird?” Alec asks, his voice so quiet now it’s almost a whisper.

“Yeah. Absolutely. But not because of that,” Izzy says.

“Look at me, dude.” Alec looks up from his pancakes, locking eyes with Jace. One blue eye, one brown. The strangest face, so beautiful in its asymmetry. “You’re not weird. You’re perfect. You’re you. Anyone who doesn’t get that doesn’t deserve you.”

Alec nods back at Jace. When he finally looks away, he sees the tail end of a look in Izzy’s eyes. A flicker of something that seems like comprehension. It makes Alec nervous.

“Can we do Jace’s sextervention now?” Alec says. “Because seriously, those Delta Kappa girls are never going to let us into a party again and it is fully your fault.”

Jace smirks at him. “Eat your pancakes, Alec.”

“Speaking of which, did Rosie make these?” Alec asks.

“No! I did! All by myself,” Izzy says, as proud as if she’d just single handedly negotiated world peace.

“Okay, see, that makes way more sense, because honestly, Iz, these are terrible.”

Jace cracks up and Izzy throws her napkin at him. Alec feels like he’s steered the conversation back into safer waters, although he’s not exactly sure what riptide they were about to hit.

“Seriously my dude, let me have some of your eggs.” Alec stabs at Jace’s plate with a fork. “No man alive needs this many eggs.”

 

**Alec, 13**

Alec would never tell his sister or Jace this, but he genuinely loved going to St. Bartholomew's on Sundays. It was important to Father that they all went as a family every week. Jace had pointed out that it seemed more important to him that people _saw_ them going every week as a family, but Alec didn’t care what his motivation was. He loved the solemnity of it, the dignified beauty, the ritual. He wasn’t that interested in God - that was far too abstract and unlikely for him. It wasn’t about God, or even faith really. But in the cavernous halls of St. Bartholomew’s, Alec felt a sense of belonging, a part of something far more important than himself, something ancient and immovable.

He’s sitting between Jace and Izzy, both of whom looked bored out of their minds. He had only succeeded in coaxing Jace out of bed this morning by promising that he would practice boxing with him later. Practicing boxing with Jace generally meant “getting hit in the stomach by Jace a whole bunch,” but Alec didn’t mind. It made Jace happy.

Izzy is (not so) covertly texting. The collection plate is passed to Robert, who (not so) discreetly puts a $100 bill in an envelope and adds it to the plate. Alec elbows Izzy hard, and she drops her phone instantly, smiling at Robert to take the plate.

“Thanks,” she mutters to Alec as she hands him the plate. He winks at her and hands it off to Jace.

Alec only sees it out of the corner of his eye, but just as Jace is about to tap the woman next to him on the shoulder, he slips two envelopes off, sliding them seamlessly into his jacket pocket. It’s so quick, so smooth, that Alec can almost convince himself it didn’t happen. But it did.

*******

After lunch, Alec tentatively knocks on the passageway door between his and Jace’s room.

“Come in,” he hears Jace call.

He pushes in. Jace has changed out of his church clothes and is neatly hanging them up in the closet. “What’s up, bro?” Jace says. “Wanna box? You promised.”

“Yeah. Sure.” Alec sits down, cross legged on Jace’s bed. “Can I talk to you about something for a minute, though?”

Jace’s face falls. “You saw, didn’t you?”

Alec nods.

“Did you tell the Senator?” Jace asks. He looks resigned, like he’s already walking through what his punishment will be, preparing himself mentally.

“Of course not,” says Alec, offended.

“Really?”

“I just - why did you do it? You know we, like, have a lot of money, right? Do you need some? Because I can give you some -” Alec says.

“No. I don’t.” Jace says.

“So why’d you steal it? You really can’t take money from a church, I think,” Alec says, solemnly.

Jace laughs a little. “It’s okay, I’m already going to hell.”

“Don’t say that, man.”

Jace is surprised. “You don’t even believe in that shit, do you?”

“Not in hell, no. But I don’t want you to think you belong there.”

The corner of Jace’s mouth tugs up in what Alec has come to recognize is the smile Jace does when he actually wants to cry. He comes and sits on the bed with Alec.

“I’m really sorry,” Jace says. “I’ll put it back next week.” Alec doesn’t say anything, just waits. He always gets the sense Jace needs a minute to work himself up to telling him something. It doesn’t come naturally to him. “I’m - “ Jace trails off.

“It’s okay,” Alec says, encouragingly. “You can tell me.”

“I’m trying to make sure I have some saved. Just in case.”

“In case what?” Alec asks.

“In case your parents decide to get rid of me. Or if something happens to them, and I’m on my own,” Jace says.

Alec is horrified. “They would never! This is your home too. They’re going to take care of you,” he says, confidently.

“My dad said it was always good to have insurance,” Jace explains. “You can’t count on anyone but yourself.”

Alec feels himself shaking his head. “Yes, you can. You can count on us. Mother and Father love you.”

Jace shrugs. “Maryse does, I think. The Senator always looks at me like I just stole something. Which I guess I did, so. He’s right not to trust me.”

“Forget about him,” Alec says. “He does trust you. But no one is getting rid of you. I won’t let them. Neither will Izzy. And even if something ever happened to them, whoever took care of me and Iz would take care of you too. Grandmother or whoever. We’re a package deal now.”

Jace looks up at him, hopeful. He clearly desperately wants to believe Alec. Alec decides right then and there that if anyone ever tried to separate him from his brother, he would stop them. It was as simple as that.

“My dad - Michael,” Jace starts. “He used to disappear sometimes.”

“What do you mean?” Alec asks, unable to imagine a world in which parents simply disappeared.

“Like he’d go out, to work, or with friends, and just not come home for a couple of days. And I had to make sure I had enough money to feed myself, and take care of shit.”

“I’m sorry,” Alec says, finding the phrase desperately inadequate for the situation.

Jace shrugs. “It’s fine. It’s just how it was, you know?” Jace is quiet for a moment. “I took some other stuff too,” he confesses.

“What kind of stuff?”

Jace climbs down from the bed and goes to his closet. Alec follows. Jace pulls out a dingy cardboard box and presents it to Alec, hanging his head. In it are the two envelopes from church, as well as some other loose bills, a watch Alec thought he had left at camp, one of his mother’s necklaces, and two boxes of granola bars. “I’m sorry. I get it if you need to tell your parents.”

“Well, I’m glad I didn’t lose that watch,” Alec says finally.

“Here,” Jace thrusts it at him. “Take it back. I’m sorry.” Alec pockets it.

“That’s Mother’s necklace, isn’t it?” Alec asks.

Jace nods. “And this is Izzy’s,” he says, pointing to a ring Alec hadn’t seen at first.

“I’ll put those back. I’m sure they haven’t noticed. Izzy is always losing her stuff, and Mother has so much.”

“Alec -” Jace starts.

“You should take the envelops back to St. Bartholomew’s next Sunday. What about the rest of the money? Is that from church, too?”

“No. Just - just picked it up around the house. When people weren’t paying attention,” Jace confesses.

“That’s okay. You can keep that. But no more, okay?”

Jace nods quickly. Alec considers him. Every time he feels like he’s really gotten to know Jace, something else is revealed, some other facet of him, some dark shadow from his former life that Alec will never truly be able to understand. He can’t imagine not being able to rely on your parents, or to know where your next meal was coming from. He thinks of the granola bars in the box and wonders how many nights Jace went hungry.

“I’ll get you some more money,” Alec says quickly.

“You don’t have to -” Jace says.

“It’s okay. We have a lot, remember? And if it’ll make you feel, you know, safe. That’s good.”

Jace looks like he’s going to protest, so Alec runs back down the passage to his room and opens his sock drawer. He knows he has $200 in there, from the last card from Grandmother. He grabs it and hurries back to Jace. “Here,” Alec says, stuffing it into Jace’s hands.

“I can’t -” Jace looks ashamed.

“Take it. I promise, it’s okay. Keep it in the box. And if I need it, I’ll just come in and get it. We can share it. But you hold on to it.”

Jace suddenly throws his arms around Alec’s neck and hugs him quickly. Alec is taken aback. Jace doesn’t usually go out of his way to touch people.

“Thank you.”

Alec shrugs. “We’re brothers.”

 

**Jace, 20**

Jace is in the gym, located in the cavernous basement of the estate. Other family members used it too, but in the years since Jace had started boxing he had taken up more and more space with various boxing paraphernalia until it was pretty much considered to be Jace’s gym. He’s running some basic combos on a punching bag. _Jab - cross - hook - cross_ _._ He adjusts his left glove and goes again, adding an uppercut. He wants to hit something that isn’t a fucking punching bag. _Jab-cross-hook-uppercut-cross_. He wants to hit _someone_.

“I think it’s dead,” Alec says, his tone deliberately airy.

Jace looks up. Alec’s leaning in the doorway watching him box. He turns his back on Alec, pulls off his gloves with his teeth and grabs the jump rope.

He starts jumping double time, keeping his back to Alec.

“Can I come in?” Alec asks.

Jace grunts, but keeps jumping. He’s finally really starting to sweat, starting to feel his muscles protest their treatment. He goes faster.

Alec sits cross-legged on the mat, watching Jace jump. He doesn’t seem to be in a hurry, so Jace ignores him. He doesn’t want company. He wants to work out until he throws up.

“What are you doing tonight?” Alec says finally.

Jace doesn’t answer for a moment, counting to thirty in his head before he stops jumping. “Dunno. Nothing.”

“Iz is going to a party at Taylor Kennedy’s, remember her, from high school?”

“With the tits, yeah?”

“I guess,” Alec shrugs. “You should go with her.”

“Nah.” Jace picks his gloves back up and returns to the punching bag, throwing a right uppercut - left hook combo.

“Okay. Well. I’m going into New York for the night. The Rolling Stones are playing a private show, and Magnus is friends with them, apparently.”

“Nice,” Jace says, trying to tighten his uppercut.

“I just don’t want you to stay down here all night.”

“I won’t.”

“Mother thinks I’m going with friends from my internship, in case she asks you.”

“Okay.”

“She’s being a total nightmare about Father’s fundraiser next month. Honestly, I think she just likes fighting with the florist.”

Jace laughs flatly.

“Don’t forget we have to go to that.”

“I know.”

Alec stands up, crossing his arms. “You gonna tell me what’s wrong at some point?” Alec asks.

“Nothing’s wrong,” Jace says, between punches.

“Is this about Magnus?”

Now Jace does stop, turning to look at his brother properly. “Why would it be about Magnus?”

“I don’t know! But you’ve been being weird all week. Since that night in New York.”

Jace snorts and turns back to the bag. _Jab-jab-uppercut-cross_. “Not everything is about you, Alec. I don’t give a shit who you date.”

How could Alec think it would matter to Jace that he was dating a guy? Jace would have died before he let anyone fuck with Alec for being gay. Hadn’t he made that clear? He throws a knock-out hook.

“Okay,” Alec says, standing up, his face impassive. “Let me know if you change your mind.”

Jace nods, and keeps at the punching bag until he hears Alec’s footsteps fading from the stairs.

*******

He knots his hair into a ponytail as he heads down the stairs and out the front door. He decides he might as well run to the boxing gym; it’s only about two miles, and it’s not like he’s in a hurry. It’s not like anyone needs him to do anything. The next three months stretch out ahead of him, overwhelming in their emptiness. Alec is busy following in Robert’s Senator / Professional Hand-Shaker career path, and Izzy is doing whatever it is that Izzy does. They’re both going to take over the world.

Jace puts his earbuds in and starts running. The first few minutes of a run always suck. Jace forces himself to settle into it, find the rhythm in his feet and his breath. _Keep breathing_ , he warns himself. _All you have to do is breath_.

He settles into it. _Breathe out. Breathe in. You’re okay_. He’s not okay. He hasn’t stopped thinking about that picture of Michael. He sees it every time he closes his eyes. But what’s he supposed to do? He’s been totally off balance since Izzy told him about the article. No. That’s not true. He’s felt off balance for much longer than that. He knows the Lightwoods all think it’s strange that he hasn’t gotten a job for this summer. He should have taken some internship, or gone to Africa to build a school, or whatever the fuck else would have gotten the Lightwood World Changer Seal of Approval. But he can’t do it anymore. He’s tried, he’s tried really fucking hard, to learn their rules and play their game, but he’s never going to be one of them. He has nothing to offer, nothing to contribute to their swirling, sparkling world of wealth and power. What he really wants is to drop out of school, but he hadn’t worked up to telling Alec yet. He just didn’t see the point in continuing to waste the Lightwood’s money, to take up the spot of someone who actually wanted and deserved to be at Harvard. But he knows it’ll crush Alec. He’ll feel abandoned, even though it has nothing to do with him. Alec always cites Jace’s NCBA ranking as evidence that he belongs at Harvard, but Jace doesn’t think being able to hit people hard is particularly impressive. He was born strong and grew up scrappy. Boxing was just a way of channeling the skills he already had, Robert’s effort to ensure he didn’t lash out in his daily life. Brute strength wasn’t something to be proud of.

Fuck. Jace slows to a walk, eventually coming to a stop. He sits down on the curb. Without fully thinking it through he pulls out his phone and googles “Nashville Center for Youth Michael Wayland”. He knows he’s not going to find anything new, but he does it anyway. He’s been returning to the photo almost every day, as if it’s going to change or tell him something. Suddenly it occurs to him to check for a phone number, which he finds helpfully listed right there on the center’s main page. _Why the fuck not_ , he thinks, pressing send. It rings only once before someone answers.

“Nashville Center for Youth, this is Gage.”

“Um. Hey.” Jace says, feeling profoundly stupid. What was he going to say, _Hey do you know my dad? He either hates me or thinks I’m dead. Any thoughts on that? Thanks!_

“Um, how can I direct your call?” poor Gage tries again.

“Yeah. Does Michael Wayland work there?”

“Uh, no. Well - we have the Michael Wayland Rehab Unit, do you want me to transfer you?”

“Nothanksbye.” Jace says in a rush. He hangs up.

So he’d funded a rehab center. Jace remembers the night when he’d come home from a friend’s house and found Michael passed out, a needle on the table and his arm tied with a shoelace. He was only nine, but he knew to call Michael’s friend Boyd, who came and cleaned him up. Michael didn’t use drugs, he had assured Jace the next day. It was quality control. Jace had just nodded. Michael wasn’t big on follow up questions, but of course now he was old enough to put two and two together. Goddammit. He kept running.

*******

With the Senator in DC and Alec in New York, it’s just him, Izzy and Maryse at dinner. Jace puts a bite of something in his mouth, although he hasn’t really been tasting his food.

“I’ll mostly be doing normal intern stuff in the office, you know,” Izzy is saying, “but I also get to go on a lot of the shoots and hopefully have some creative input.”

“That’s wonderful, Isabelle,” Mayse says. “But careful not to put yourself above ‘normal intern stuff,’ as you called it. Doing that kind of work reliably is how you build a reputation at a company, especially one as competitive as Vogue.”

“I understand,” Izzy says. She glances quickly at Jace, who realizes he’s still chewing whatever it was he’s trying to eat. “I’m excited. Jace, will you help me move my things into the New York apartment this week? I start Wednesday and want to have some time to settle in.”

Jace nods, and finally Maryse turns her attention to him.

“Are you alright, Jace? You look a bit ill.”

He swallows roughly. “Maryse, is my father still alive?”

Izzy coughs into her wine glass, looking from Jace to her mother.

“I’m sorry, dear?” asks Maryse carefully.

“You heard me. Is Michael Wayland still alive?” Jace can hear how harsh he sounds and he hates it, hates himself for speaking to the only mother he has ever known this way. He had meant to ease into it, to not assume wrongdoing, but he couldn’t keep sitting there, eating their food and drinking their wine and not knowing.

Maryse sighs heavily. “Isabelle, please go to your room for a moment.”

“Um - “ Izzy looks to Jace for instruction.

“No. Izzy can stay.” Jace says. “Tell me.”

Maryse puts her fork down, pushing her plate away. This is, in itself, confirmation enough that something is terribly wrong, and Jace feels his stomach drop away from his body. What had he wanted? For Maryse to gasp, deny it, be just as shocked as he was? To assure him this was all a bad dream and his life was exactly what he had always thought it to be?

“This is something Robert and I had hoped to tell you when you were older,” Maryse starts. “I’m so sorry. But it’s complicated. You were so young, and you had already been hurt so badly. We didn’t want to make it worse.”

“You lied to me.” Jace says, the incontrovertible simplicity of it repulsing him.

“Jace, please,” Maryse says. “We love you. Robert and I, we always loved you, just the same as we love Alec and Isabelle. We wanted to protect you.”

Izzy opens her mouth to speak, but stops herself. She shifts imperceptibly closer to Jace and puts her hand on his knee. The weight of her palm is the only thing holding him down, keeping him from floating away into a nothingness.

“As far as I know, yes, Michael is still alive. But I have no idea where he is, or what he’s doing.”

“He lives in Nashville,” says Izzy.

Maryse glares at her daughter, apparently betrayed that Izzy has been colluding with Jace on this.

“Nashville. I suppose that’s how you found him, then?”

Izzy nods, and Maryse continues. “Your father was badly burned in the fire. He was in the hospital for a long time. We heard about it, and that was how we learned you were still alive, Jace. We thought you had died, in the car accident that killed your mother and sister. Celine was my best friend. If we had thought, even for a moment, that you were still alive, we would have tried to adopt you sooner.”

Jace swallows, which seems to require far more concentration than usual. He wants Maryse to stop. He wants this whole thing to stop.

But she continues. “You were going into foster care, while Michael was in the hospital. There was no one to claim you. That’s when we found you. We - I’m not proud of this, Jace. I’m not, and neither is Robert. But it truly did seem like he was going to die for awhile. And when he didn’t, we all agreed you would have a better life here, with us. Michael agreed to stay away, to give you a chance at a future -”

Jace slams his fist on the table, rattling the silverware. “I had a future. You took it away from me, you lied to me, my entire life -” Jace hears his voice rising, feels Izzy’s grip tighten on his leg.

“Please, Jace,” Maryse is almost begging. She seems frightened of Jace’s anger, which makes him feel ashamed and dirty, like a rabid dog that got loose in the house. “For all intents and purposes, it was as if Michael Wayland _had_ died. You don’t know what he was like. It was simpler this way, it gave you a chance to start over.”

Jace stands abruptly, knocking over his chair. Maryse startles at the noise. “I need to go,” Jace says, not sure what he means by it. Izzy jumps to her feet too, loyal to a fault. “No, Izzy. Stay.”

And Jace turns on his heel, half-running out of the room, feeling more alone than he has in his entire life.

 

**Alec, 20**

By the time Alec and Magnus leave the concert, Alec has decided three things; 1) he’s a little bit in love with Mick Jagger 2) he’s drunk 3) he wants to go home with Magnus Bane. Magnus guides Alec towards an unmarked SUV, parked out front amidst a sea of waiting taxis and cars.

“This is us,” Magnus says.

Alec likes the sound of there being an ‘us’. “How do you know which one is yours?” he asks.

“I just choose one and get in and hope they take me where I’m going,” Magnus laughs.

It is apparently, the correct car, because the driver nods once at the boys and rolls up the partition.

“Where are we going?” Alec asks, buzzed on martinis and dancing and kissing and anticipation.

“How do you feel about going back to my place?” Magnus asks.

“I feel very,” Alec kisses Magnus. “Very.” He kisses him again. “Very good about it.”

*******

The car drops them off in front of Magnus’s loft and he trips up the stairs a little while Magnus tries to find his keys. Magnus laughs at him.

“Hey listen,” Alec says, leaning against the brick, “you’re not doing that much better yourself.” He leans his head back against the door, smiling down at Magnus.

“You’re real cute, you know that, right?” Magnus says.

“If you say so,” Alec whispers in his ear.

“I do say so,” Magnus whispers against Alec’s lips and so Alec has to kiss him, and for a long moment he’s just still, pressing his lips tightly to Magnus’s. He kisses him like he knows he has all night to kiss him, like he isn’t afraid to lose him. Like he knows Magnus is his.

Finally, Magnus breaks away and grabs his hands, pulling him inside and to the elevators.

The loft is gorgeous, of course, all sleek modern lines. “Damn,” Alec says in appreciation.

“You like it?” Magnus asks. “I’m almost never in New York but it’s one of my favorite homes. Want a tour?”

Alec nods, and Magnus grabs his hand, pulling him onto the raised kitchen dais. “This is the kitchen.”

“I got that,” Alec teases.

“This is the living room,” he says, pointing at the couch in the center of the loft.

“And what’s behind those black curtains?” Alec asks.

“That, my dear Alexander,” Magnus says, “is the bedroom.”

Magnus pulls him towards the back of the loft and Alec’s stomach drops, but he’s less nervous than he thought he would be. He’s nervous obviously, he’s Alec Lightwood, but feels more like excitement than anxiety.

Magnus pushes him down on the bed, kissing his jaw, his neck, pulling Alec’s shirt up over his head and kissing his chest. Alec moans, running his fingers through Magnus’s hair.

Lips against his neck, Magnus asks, “Do you want to do this?”

“Yes,” Alec says. “Please.”

He kisses him, and then figures he might as well tell him. Magnus will understand. “Listen, Magnus -”. Magnus pulls away instantly, eyes finding Alec’s.

“You okay?” he says.

“Yeah. Yeah. I just - I’ve never um, -”

“Oh, sure. You’ve never been with a guy before?” Magnus finishes for him.

Technically he’s never been with anyone, but he feels like this is sufficient disclosure and nods.

“Don’t worry. We’ll go really slow, okay?” Magnus says, putting his hands on either side of Alec’s face, not breaking eye contact.

Alec nods until Magnus is kissing him again and he’s far too busy to remember what he was talking about in the first place.

*******

Alec’s phone is ringing.

“Alec,” says a sleepy voice. “Alec. Wake up.” Magnus shoves his shoulder, shaking him from sleep. It takes a moment for Alec to remember where he is. Naked. In Magnus’s bed. It’s morning, Alec can see the sun trying to push it’s way in through the curtains. Oh my god. He had sex with Magnus Bane. He had sex with Magnus Bane and it was _amazing_. “Alec. Your phone.”

Alec sits up and takes his phone from Magnus just as the call goes to voicemail. Missed Calls: Izzy Lightwood (4). Four? Izzy knew he was with Magnus. She wouldn’t have called him so many times unless something was really wrong. Panic grips him.

“Everything okay?” Magnus asks.

Alec nods. “Sorry. My sister.” He’s already calling her back, waiting for it to ring through.

Magnus smiles at him and lays back down, and Alec puts his hand on his chest, stroking it absently. Magnus sighs happily and burrows back down into the sheets.

“Alec, I’m so sorry,” Izzy says, by way of a hello.

“What’s wrong? What happened?” Alec says.

Izzy sounds on the cusp of tears, and now Alec is really panicking. “It’s Jace. Last night, Mother told him everything. His dad is alive, they’ve been lying to him, Alec, lying to us our whole lives.”

Alec’s hand freezes over Mangus’s skin. “That’s not possible.”

“I know. But it’s true. She told him, at dinner, and then he went to his room. I didn’t know what to do, he wanted to be alone, and I let him. Maybe I shouldn’t have, maybe I did the wrong thing, but I went to that stupid party -” she’s breathless.

“It’s okay, Iz, just tell me -”

“I knocked and knocked this morning and he didn’t answer and finally I decided to go in through the passage, through your room, you know, because his door was locked. And he had left. Packed a bag and everything. He took your BMW.”

“What?” Alec says, still not comprehending.

“Jace is gone, Alec. He’s gone.”


	2. Demons

iMessage: Alec Lightwood _to_ Jace Wayland

  * (9:41AM) Izzy just called im so sorry. Are u ok? Ill come meet you?
  * (9:57AM) Are you going to Nashville?
  * (9:58AM) Love you man.



iMessage: Izzy Lightwood _to_ Jace Wayland:

  * (9:34AM) J, im rly rly sorry. U ok?
  * (9:35AM) Love you so much. Let us come help you??
  * (10:04AM) Plz just let me know ur safe?



iMessage Group Chat: Lightwood Babez

  * JW - (10:17AM) Did you guys know?
  * AL - (10:17AM) No.
  * IL - (10:18AM) Wed never lie to u.
  * AL - (10:18AM) Promise. So sorry.
  * IL - (10:18AM) Where r u? Ill come get u.
  * JW - (10:27AM) I’m going to Nashville. Need to do this alone.
  * JW - (10:28AM) Sorry I took ur car, Al.



 

**Alec, 17**

There was absolutely nothing to do at the Bridgehampton house except drink. So drink they did. The always spent a week or two out there in the summer, sometimes longer if Father could get away. And by the time they were teenagers, the three of them had started going out alone for long weekends, even in the winter. They would spend all day in the old wooden house, drinking and talking and playing stupid games and arguing. It was perpetually damp in there, no matter what Maryse did, but it was cozy. They would steal quilts from all the bedrooms and make a nest in the front room by the fireplace.

Alec was stupidly content, the way only a happy drunk kid can be. It was raining, had been all weekend, and the wifi had gone out. Normally this would have inspired Izzy (and him, to be fair) to have a full meltdown and demand a return to Bethesda, but they had all agreed to stick it out. They hadn’t left the house in two days, and without internet or reliable phone service, it felt vaguely like they were the only three people left on earth. He loved it.

Alec is sitting on the couch, Jace’s head in his lap. Izzy is sprawled on the floor, her head somewhat precariously close to the fireplace. They had been playing Monopoly but got too drunk to follow the rules and it had degenerated quickly.

“I just don’t think it’s _ethical_ ,” Izzy says, “to use Free Parking that way.”

“Capitalism is unethical,” points out Jace, “so it’s a bit of a moot point for the game.” Alec doesn’t totally remember how Jace ended up laying in his lap, but he’s not upset about it. Feeling reckless from the drink and emboldened by their apocalyptic insularity, Alec lets himself put his hand on Jace’s head. Jace doesn’t react, so Alec hovers there, not quite releasing the full weight of his hand. Like a frightened child dipping just a toe in the water.

“ _Pecuniate obediunt omnia_ ,” mumbles Alec.

“Mhhm,” agrees Jace.

“Um, English please. Not all of us are fucking Latin nerds,” objects Izzy.

“All things obey money,” translates Jace. “Capitalism always wins, basically.”

“Well I’m sorry that only the boys’ school has Latin,” Izzy says, sitting up. “Sacred Heart focuses on teaching us young Catholic ladies far more important things. Like backstabbing. And anorexia.” She looks at the boys. “Aww, aren’t you two cute.”

Jace stretches out an arm to hit his sister but can’t reach her over the coffee table, so he just gestures vaguely in her direction. She leans back, further avoiding his hand.

“We need more alcohol.” Izzy announces, staggering to her feet and into the kitchen.

“We do _not_ ,” says Jace.

Alec’s hand is still on Jace. Without thinking, he lets himself slide his thumb across the shaved, stubbly side of Jace’s head. He realizes what he’s doing and catches his breath for a second. But Jace says nothing, so Alec does it again. “Feels good,” mumbles Jace, his eyes closed. Alec’s chest is tight. He must be really drunk.

But then Izzy is back with the bottle of Patron. “We have to finish it or it will go bad,” she says. She picks up Jace’s feet and sits, cross-legged, at the other end of the couch, facing Alec.

Jace rolls onto his back, keeping his head on Alec’s leg. “That is absolutely not how alcohol works. Aren’t you supposed to be the smart one?”

Izzy grabs a shot glass that’s been left on the table and fills it with tequila.

“We’re playing Never Have I Ever. And I am the smart one, thank you very much.”

“What does that make me?” Alec demands.

“You’re the pretty one,” Jace assures him.

“Jace is the pretty one,” says Izzy.

“Wow. Stabbed in the back.”

“Told you, they train us well at Sacred Heart,” Izzy says with a wink at Jace.

“Tough break, brother,” says Jace, looking back up at Alec through his eyebrows. Alec puts his hand over Jace’s eyes, and Jace flips his head back, trying to snap Alec’s hand in his teeth. Alec laughs.

“Focus, you dildos. We’re playing Never Have I Ever. Every time you put a finger down you do a shot.”

“Oh my God, that is not how this game works,” protests Jace.

“It is now,” says Izzy. “I changed the rules.”

“You’re a born dictator, my love,” says Jace.

“Thank you. I’ll go first.” Izzy flips her curtain of dark curls. “Never have I ever kissed a girl.”

Jace rolls his eyes. “Cheating, but fine.” He sits up and takes the shot Izzy poured. He refills it and hands it to Alec. Technically, Alec has only kissed one girl, that redhead at Macy Roman’s birthday party last year. He’s grateful the fine print of this game doesn’t demand such disclosures. He wonders if Jace knows already, though. Probably. What _doesn’t_ Jace know. He knocks back the tequila, feeling it burn all the way down. He splutters a little and Jace thumps him on the back.

“My turn,” Jace says. “Never have I ever gotten locked out of the house with no clothes on.”

“Oh my God that was _one time_!” Izzy yells. Alec and Jace laugh as she downs her shot.

“Never have I ever gotten a tattoo,” Alec says.

“Oh, fuck you,” Jace groans.

“Technically you should take two shots, as you’ve gotten two,” Alec points out.

“What!” Izzy demands. “What’s the second one?! When!!”

“Last month. When me and Alec were in New York.”

“And you didn’t even tell me?! Such betrayal, at the hands of mine own brothers, too. Let’s see it.”

Jace sighs as if he’s being terribly put upon, and stands up, moving to the center of the room. Izzy scoots down the couch towards him, so he puts his arm around his baby sister. Jace takes off his shirt. Alec sees Jace shirtless pretty much every day of their lives, but that doesn’t mean he stops appreciating it. Jace worked hard to get his abs like that, the least Alec could do was look at them, right?

In addition to the intricate, abstract line drawing that was Jace’s first tattoo, on his forearm, he’s added four arrows, crossed over each other on his right pec. Alec had gone with him to get it, when the boys had been in the city for a Kendrick Lamar concert. It had been a whim, and Alec had watched him get inked with a sort of hungry jealousy. The ability to live so freely, so impulsively, knowing what you wanted and then simply doing it, was utterly foreign to Alec. Alec was the master of ignoring the things his brain told him he wanted.

“Ooooh I love it!” says Izzy, jumping up to get a closer look. “Does it mean anything in particular?” She rubs her finger over the tattoo, and Alec feels an irrational flash of annoyance at his sister.

“Yeah,” says Jace. “Um. For my family. My mom and dad and Clarissa. I wanted to represent - you know, the four of us. Being together. Somewhere, at least.”

Izzy throws her arms around Jace and hugs him tightly. Izzy was so free with her love, so open and unafraid. He envied her. Jace picks her up, ignoring her screeching, and walks the few steps to the couch to dump her on top of Alec.

“Owww,” Alec complains. Izzy settles on top of him, crushing an organ he’s pretty sure is important with her shoulder.

“Why don’t you have a tattoo for _us_ ,” Izzy demands. “We’re your family too.”

“Izzy,” Alec scolds, but Jace laughs.

“I’ll get a Lightwood tattoo if you two do it with me.”

“Yeah, right,” says Izzy. “When I want Mother to actually kill me, I’ll get right on that.”

“Remember when you came home with your first one, J?” says Alec.

“Poor Maryse thought I’d joined a biker gang,” Jace laughs.

“I would get a tattoo,” Alec says, absently.

“You want to be a _lawyer_ , Alexander,” Izzy reminds him. “Good luck with that.”

“Forget law school, good luck making it out of high school alive if your dad found out,” Jace says.

But now that Alec has said it, he feels he’s started something, and he’s determined to watch it play out to the end. To prove something. He’s not sure what, or to whom, but his drunk brain has decided it’s desperately important.

“Would you do it with me? Get a tattoo?” Alec asks Jace. He pushes Izzy off him and stands up, looking intently at his brother.

“Hell fucking yeah I would,” says Jace. “Are you kidding?”

“Let’s do it,” Alec extends his hand and Jace grabs it, pulling him in for a hug. He’s still shirtless.

“I can do it. Right now. I learned how to do stick and pokes at camp,” says Izzy, climbing off the couch.

“Jesus. Where are they sending you, a Russian work camp?” Alec asks.

“It’s a girl’s camp for manners and cotillion prep.” Izzy says primly. Then she shrugs. “We get bored.”

“Teenage girls are terrifying,” says Alec.

“True that,” agrees Jace.

“I think there’s a bottle of India ink upstairs. Let me find it.” Izzy runs off.

“Dude, you know how much I hate to be the voice of reason, but aren’t you going to be pissed if you wake up tomorrow with a tattoo?” Jace asks.

“No. I want it. I’ve been thinking about getting one, since I went with you.” Alec says. “And we’ll do it together.”

“Yeah, but I’m not out here trying to become Attorney General or whatever.”

“We’ll put it somewhere I can hide,” Alec says, a little breathlessly. He knows he’s being stupid, but he doesn’t care. If they get matching tattoos together right now, this moment, this feeling, this togetherness will be captured permanently, marked on their skin for eternity. They would belong to each other, fully and irrevocably, and everyone would know it.

Jace laughs, caught up in Alec’s excitement. “Okay, man. Let the record show I tried to talk you out of it though, for when Robert is considering murdering me.”

“What should we do?” Alec asks.

Izzy storms back in. “Got the ink! And I sterilized the needle. God you guys, I genuinely did not anticipate how helpful learning to use a needle properly would be.”

Alec squints, thinking. “Something simple, and small, so it’s easy for Izzy.”

“ _Fratres Aeternitatem,_ ” suggests Jace. “Brothers for life,” he translates, before Izzy can yell at him.

“Well that’s neither small nor simple, but I can do it,” Izzy says.

“ _Fratres in Vitam_ ,” Alec corrects. “I wouldn’t use the accusative here, would you?”

“Fuck dude, I’m getting a C in Latin,” laughs Jace. “Whatever you say.”

“fratres in vitam?” Alec says again. “All lowercase, really simple. What do you think?”

“I think we should do it,” Jace says.

“Fuck yeah you should!” yells Izzy. “Someone write it down for me though because fuck if I know how to spell that.” She grabs a pen and notepad and Alec carefully writes out the phrase. Brothers forever. He and Jace, forever. It felt right. “Who’s going first?” she asks.

“It’s going to hurt like a motherfucker, you know that right?” warns Jace.

“I can handle it.” Alec says, more confidently than he feels. “I’ll go first.”

To say that it hurt like a motherfucker was a gross understatement. Alec is pretty sure he’s going to throw up the entire time. Izzy straddles his chest as she tattoos his ribcage, her handwriting small and strangely neat for a drunk fifteen year old girl with a single needle. Jace is holding him still, pinning him down to the ground. He distracts himself imagining what the scene would look like to some unsuspecting third party if they were to wander in. Alec isn’t crying but tears keep falling out of his eyes. He makes this distinction several times to Jace, who just keeps laughing at him. “Just wait your fucking turn, man. You’ll cry too.” Alec says.

Jace, of course, does not cry.

“It does hurt though, right? It’s hurting you?” Alec confirms, looking down at Jace. He’s holding a linen towel to his ribcage to absorb the blood and extra ink.

“Of course it’s fucking hurting. God damn motherfucker shit _goddammit_ , Isabelle.” Jace grits his teeth, grabbing Alec’s hand and squeezing it tightly. This mollifies Alec slightly.

“Okayyyy, almost done,” Izzy says. “There.” She wipes some blood and ink away with her finger, admiring her handiwork. “God, I’m good.”

“You really, really are,” agrees Alec, genuinely impressed with what Izzy has done.

“New rule,” Jace groans. “Izzy is never allowed to come near me with a needle again.”

“Honestly, fair,” Izzy laughs.

Alec pulls Jace to his feet, and the two go to stand in front of the hallway mirror. The skin is red and raised around the black font, but the writing is straight and even - fratres in vitam. “It’s perfect,” Alec says.

Jace smiles back at their reflections, throwing his arm around Alec. “Yeah. It is.” Jace tilts his head to lean against Alec’s shoulder, and they stay that way for a moment, looking at each other in the mirror. Brothers. Forever.

 

**Jace, 20**

Jace is an hour outside of Nashville when he pulls the car over onto the shoulder and puts his head down on the steering wheel. He’d driven all night in a haze, focused only on getting away from home and getting towards his father. He hadn’t really thought much beyond that, but now that he’s so close, the weight of what he’s learned, and what he’s done, hits him fully. He feels bad only about leaving Alec and Izzy like that - but Izzy would go to work and be happy and distracted in New York. And Alec had Magnus now. Neither of them needed him, not the way he’d always needed them.

Okay, enough. He needs a plan. What should he do, go to the Center and just yell until someone tells him how to find Michael? He sighs, pulling back onto the freeway. Of course that’s exactly what he was going to do. Well, no one had ever accused him of being a good planner. That’s what Alec was for.

***

It goes pretty much as smoothly as expected. But after 45 minutes someone finally calls someone who calls the president who calls Michael. Jace has no idea what they tell him (he imagines it’s something like _some junkie kid is down here pretending to be your son, can you come clear this up so we can put him in lockdown_ ). Whatever it is it works, because they tell him to wait in someone’s office, Michael’s on his way. Which brings Jace to this shitty office, where he’s pacing under the shitty fluorescent lights and trying to imagine what the fuck possessed him to come down here and confront a father who didn’t want him anymore.

And then Michael opens the door, without ceremony. He looks exactly the same as Jace remembers him, but better, somehow. More solid and tangible and _real_ than he used to.

“Jace,” he says, slowly. “I always hoped you would find me one day, son.”

“Dad?” Jace says, voice breaking like he’s a fucking kid.

“Yes. I’m so sorry, son. I’m so sorry.” And then Jace’s heart stops a little because his father is hugging him. The strong embrace he thought he would never feel again, the man he thought he had heard die, is holding him. “I’m so glad you found me,” he says again, but all Jace can process right now is the physicality of it, the weight of his father, of Michael Wayland’s arms around him.

“What -” Jace starts, not knowing how to ask. It’s too big. “How?”

“Let me take you to dinner. I can explain everything.”

Jace nods dumbly and then his father has his hand on his back and is guiding him out of the office.

***

They’re just sitting down at the restaurant when the magic of it wears off and Jace gets mad.

As soon as the waiter walks away, Jace says “How could you? How could you let me think - my whole life -”.

Michael sighs heavily. He’s always been a large man, but now he’s more muscular, taut. Jace isn’t sure he could take him in a fight, which is saying something. He’s firm and imposing. That’s the thing that strikes Jace the most - that his child impression of his father as an immovable mountain was correct.

“The Lightwoods didn’t give me a choice,” Michael says.

“Just start at the beginning,” Jace says brusquely.

“I was in the hospital, after the fire -”

“I know that part.”

Michael lifts his hands in supplication. “Jace, I don’t know how to do this either. I dreamed about this day, but I never let myself believe it could happen.”

Jace nods, chastised.

“I was badly burned.” Michael pulls an arm from his leather jacket to show Jace a heavily scarred arm. “But I survived.” He sighs. “The Lightwoods hate me. They always have, since the day I met your mother. Maryse didn’t approve of me, didn’t think I was good enough for Celine.”

Jace doesn’t have a difficult time imagining the Lightwoods disapproving of someone who didn’t meet their impossibly high standards.

“And I wasn’t. I wasn’t a very good husband, or a very good father. I know that Jace, and I’m sorry.”

“Yes you were,” says Jace. “You were the best.”

Michael smiles and Jace feels everything else in his life falls away. “You don’t know how happy it makes me to hear you say that, son. But I was in a bad way after the fire, and I couldn’t take care of you the way you should have been taken care of. The Lightwoods offered to adopt you. On the condition that I never contacted you again. They told me you had already been informed I died in the fire.”

Jace is making a fist in his lap and feels his nails biting into his skin.

“And you just...let them?”

“They threatened me. They said they would have me arrested, if I ever tried to see you again.”

“Arrested for what?” Jace asks.

“Son, Senator Lightwood is a very, very powerful man. I had no doubt he could have arranged everything. I would have spent the rest of my life in jail, where there was no chance we could be reunited. But this way; well, I was out here, hoping that somewhere you were happy, that you were becoming the man I always wanted you would be. And that one day, you would come find me. And now you have.”

“Can I -” Jace hesitates, unsure how to ask this, unsure what will happen if the answer is no. “Can I stay with you. For a little? I just can’t go back to them -”

“Jace,” Michael puts out his hand, and tentatively, Jace allows his father to take his hand. He can’t remember his father ever going out of his way to touch him before. He just wasn’t like that. “Jace, I want you to stay with me forever. You never have to go back to them.”

Jace smiles, grateful. He doesn’t do forever, he doesn’t plan past tomorrow, a relic of the survival mentality that had gotten him this far. But right now he knows he wants to be with his father, and his father wants him, and that’s enough.

“I know what they can be like,” Michael continues, releasing his hand. “Always making you feel like you’re not good enough for them. Like you’ll never really be one of them?”

“Robert hates me,” Jace says, vocalizing for the first time what he had known in the pit of his stomach since age fourteen. He feels a pang of regret, like he’s betraying Alec and Izzy by saying this. But it’s true. It’s separate from how he feels about them. They would get that.

“He doesn’t understand you. He doesn’t _deserve_ to understand you,” Michael says, and there’s something mesmerizing about his voice. Jace remembers how Michael had always been able to talk people into doing just about anything.

“Michael - Dad,” Jace starts, and Michael nods encouragingly, smiling. “My sister - Izzy Lightwood, I mean - she found you because of an arrest report. Something about breaking and entering?”

Michael’s smile flickers, but then holds firm. “That was a misunderstanding. They dropped the charges. I’m good friends with the Mayor, you know. We got it all sorted out.”

“Okay,” Jace says. God. He wants so desperately to surrender to this moment, to his father, but he’s still wary. He guesses he has Michael to thank for that. He had taught him to always look for the answer behind the answer, to see the truth as what someone directed you away from, not toward.

Jace leans back in his chair, his head pounding. He had driven all night, running on coffee and Red Bull and the singular intensity of his need to find Michael, but now it was catching up to him. “Fuck, my head is killing me” Jace says, “I need a drink.”

“You’re underage, son,” Michael says.

Jace raises an eyebrow at him. “I just mean they won’t serve you here,” Michael corrects. He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a prescription pill bottle. “Have one of these. It’ll help get you through.”

He extends the bottle of Jace, who takes it slowly. “What is it?”

“Oxycodone.” Michael is staring at him, and Jace suddenly has the undeniable sense that this is a test.

“You funded a rehab center. Shouldn’t you, you know, not give your kid pills?”

“Yes, and I’m very proud of the work we do at the Center. Drug addiction is a terrible thing. I’m sure you’ve realized by now, how much of your childhood I spent abusing drugs.”

Jace nods, slowly, unused to being spoken to so directly, like a peer. Maryse and Robert spoke to them like they were still nine.

“That was why I allowed the Lightwoods to adopt you. I knew I wasn’t a good father, I couldn’t be there for you the way a father should be. I cleaned up, worked hard; and now you’ve come back to me,” Michael continues.

“So you don’t, anymore? Use drugs?” Jace asks.

“I indulge occasionally. There’s nothing wrong with it as long as you don’t let it control your life, son. But I’ve made a real name for myself here. I’m part of the community. I work with the Mayor to ensure we run a clean enterprise. Everything above board and safe. All of that.”

“You’re a drug dealer,” Jace says simply. He supposes he must have always known this about his father, he’d just never turned this stone over before, not wanting to see the worms squirm underneath.

“Yes,” Michael says, looking him directly in the eye. “There’s always going to be a demand for drugs. My operation is unique - no violence, no mess, no kids getting hurt. Nothing like that. It’s an incredible thing we’ve built down here, Jace. I want you to see it.” He pauses. “To be part of it.”

Jace stares back at his father. Michael had always played by his own rules, and as a child Jace had often felt like he was struggling to even figure out what the game was. And then his father was lost to him. But now they’re here and Michael is looking at him like an equal, a partner. A son. A son he was proud of.

“Does that bother you?” Michael asks.

“No,” Jace says. He swallows the pill.

 

**Alec, 20**

Alec had flown back to Bethesda that morning, kissing Magnus goodbye and apologizing for his sudden departure. Magnus had reassured him - _I understand how important your family is to you_ , he’d said, kissing Alec on the forehead. _Go be with them_. He was right, of course. But this was more than family. This was Jace.

Now Alec is in Izzy’s room. They’d called Robert together, and he had sighed, seemingly irritated by the whole affair. _You were just children. It was complicated_. _Let Jace find out for himself who his father really is and then he’ll come back._ He hadn’t apologized, hadn’t even had the grace to sound ashamed of himself, the way Maryse had. At least Maryse had seemed worried about Jace, but she shared Robert’s opinion that the whole thing was a little road trip of self-discovery. But Alec knew better. Jace couldn’t stomach betrayal. He considered loyalty the height of honor, and in his mind, Alec was sure, the entire Lightwood family was now marred, tainted by association. Alec genuinely wasn’t sure Jace would ever come back. 

Izzy, at least, understood the gravity. She was pacing around her room while Alec lay listless on the bed. “What are we supposed to do?” she asks for possibly the nineteenth time.

“Nothing, Iz. He doesn’t want to talk to us. He said he had to do this alone.” Alec feels dull, subdued. There’s a low buzzing in his head that started this morning and now seems like it may never stop.

Izzy sighs and crawls onto the bed with him, laying her head down on his chest. “Distract me, please. Tell me about Magnus.”

Alec smiles, letting himself remember, letting himself feel something other than anxiety for his brother. “We had sex,” he says.

“WHAT!” Izzy screams, popping back up. “Alec!!!! You didn’t tell me!!!”

“It’s been a busy day,” he says defensively.

“So?? How was it??”

Alec rolls his eyes. “It was amazing, obviously. I mean the sex was great, really, but also it was just so incredible to you know, be with someone, a guy, to feel like I knew for sure. You know?”

Izzy laughs at his inarticulate response. “I do know. Well I don’t really, but I understand. I’m so happy for you.”

Izzy’s phone, on the bed between them, lights up with a text. Then another.

“Jace?” Alec asks hopefully.

Izzy glances at it and shakes her head, ignoring the messages. “So when do I get to meet your boyfriend?” she says.

“Oh God, is he my boyfriend?” Alec says, finding the idea of it both thrilling and rather panic-inducing.

Izzy’s phone buzzes again. Then a call comes in. “You’re popular,” Alec says.

Izzy checks her phone. “That’s weird, why is Macy Roman calling me?”

“Dunno. Try answering it,” Alec suggests.

Izzy rolls her eyes at him and picks up the phone.

“Hello?”

She stands up, slowly crossing the room. “What? Why? How do you know that?”

Alec looks up, intrigued now. Could this be about Jace? He’s pretty sure Jace had sex with Macy Roman once, but if they’re using that criteria to try and track him down it could take decades.

“No, I haven’t seen it, so just fucking tell me what you’re talking about,” says Izzy.

Alec raises his eyebrows at her, reaching into his back pocket for his own phone.

“I have to go,” Izzy says immediately, hanging up. She turns to Alec before he can get his phone out.

“Jesus, Iz, what?”

“There’s photos.”

“Okay? Photos of...?” Alec says, still trying to make sense of this whole thing in the context of Jace’s departure.

“Photos of you and Magnus. Together. Kissing. And they’re everywhere.”

“What?”

Izzy crosses the room to him, holding out her phone. It’s a paparazzi picture, from last night, when he had kissed Magnus at the door. God. It felt like a lifetime ago now. How stupidly arrogant he had been, thinking they could get away with that.

“You’re not the story, obviously, Magnus is. But they’ve ID’d you. And they mention - “

“Father,” Alec finishes. “I have to call Magnus.”

“I’ll go,” says Izzy, even though they’re in her room.

“No,” Alec grabs her hand. “Please stay with me.”

He grabs his phone and sees that he too has a few texts, but none are from Jace so he ignores them. “How did Macy Roman know so quickly?”

“She fucking loves Little Things, all my friends do. Macy probably has google alerts for Magnus.”

Alec shakes his head, feeling his heart thumping in his chest. God. Of course. _This is what happens,_ he berates himself _, when you’re careless_. Alec prided himself on not slipping up, not getting distracted. He had always known exactly what his goals were and how we was going to get to them. Magnus had come into his life like a hurricane, and Alec had let himself get swept away, breaking all his own rules.

Magnus answers his phone on the first ring. “I was about to call you, Alexander.”

“I’m so sorry,” Alec says. Izzy sits next to him on the bed, squeezing his hand.

“Oh, don’t worry about me. Honestly, it’s a miracle it didn’t happen sooner. I haven’t exactly been discreet. Are you going to be okay?”

“Yeah. I think so. Not necessarily how I would have wanted to tell my parents, but -”

Magnus laughs. “I should have warned you this was a hazard of dating me.”

“I had an idea of what I was getting into.”

“Ugh, I have to call my publicist back. She wants me to tweet about it.”

Alec snorts. “What in the world are you supposed to say?”

“Please respect my privacy, blah blah blah, love is love. Something like that. I dunno. Honestly if these people haven’t figured it out by now it’s on them.”

“I’m sorry, again,” Alec says.

“Really Alexander, you have to stop apologizing. It’s not your fault.” Magnus pauses for a moment. “Are you going to be okay?”

“Yeah,” Alec says.”Yeah.”

“So have you heard from your brother? He come home?”

“Not yet,” Alec says, his stomach tightening.

“I’m sorry.” He breaks off. “That’s my publicist again. Call me later?”

“I will.”

“And you’re sure you’re okay?”

“Yes,” Alec says, almost smiling. “Promise.”

“Okay. Hey.”

“Hey what?”

“I wish you were still here,” Magnus says.

“Me too,” Alec says, and this time he actually does smile.

“Okay now I’m really going. I’ll call you back.”

“Bye.”

“Goodbye Alexander.”

Alec hangs up. “Well. He’s okay with it.”

“Are _you_ okay?” Izzy asks.

“Yes. No. Yes.”

Izzy’s phone starts ringing again and she silences it. “These bitches. They all just became your number one fan.”

Alec stands up, paces to the window. “Do you think - our parents...”

“They better fucking be cool. It’s 2017.”

“Um, have you met our father?” Alec asks.

Izzy goes to her brother and grabs his shoulder, steadying him. “We can’t control what Father will say. This isn’t how any of this should have happened, but we can’t control that either. But you have done _nothing_ wrong. Promise me you know that.”

“I know,” Alec says. He does know, but the simmering sense of panic in his stomach tells him differently. There were going to be consequences, for him, yes, but also for Father. And for the rest of the family. That was the problem with being part of a political dynasty. If one of them fell, they all went down like dominos. His phone buzzes with an email. “Jesus. It’s the Senator’s office,” he says.

“What?”

“Father’s secretary. She’s scheduling me for a meeting with him. Tonight. 7PM.”

Izzy bites her lip, fear clear on her face despite her reassurances. “Okay. Well. That’s pretty neutral, right?”

Alec shakes his head. “I don’t think so.”

“I’ll come with you,” Izzy says.

“It’s okay,” Alec says, suddenly feeling oddly calm. “I’ll go alone. It’s going to be fine. Stay here in case Jace calls...or comes home.”

Izzy nods, and she looks on the verge of tears which irritates Alec. He doesn’t want sympathy. He will go meet his father, and he will weather whatever storm is coming. He brought it upon himself, so he’ll handle it by himself.

***

His sense of eerie calm lasts until the moment he enters his father’s office in DC. It’s late enough that almost everyone else has gone home. Robert’s secretary is still there, though. She watches him cross the room, staring with open interest as she instructs him to take a seat. She would, of course, have seen the pictures. The back of his neck burns. He feels humiliated, exposed. Like they’ve pulled back the curtain and revealed him as a fraud. But what was exposed, really? It wasn’t like it was indecent; his nudes weren’t plastered online, like that poor girl their freshman year of Harvard whose computer got hacked. It was only a story because of who he had been kissing, not because he was gay. People couldn’t really care that much about him, about his life? He straightens himself, pulling his shoulders down, the way Jace always told him to do when you were resetting in the ring.

Finally, Father opens the door. He’s on his phone, still talking, but he gestures for Alec to enter. Alec paces around the office while his father speaks into his cell.

“Of course. Of course, it’ll all be taken care of.”

Alec looks at the row of framed photographs. One of him, one of Izzy, one of Mother. Jace makes his only appearance in one of the three group photos on the shelf.

“Thanks for getting back to me so quickly. We’ll talk soon.”

Robert hangs up the phone and looks fully at him. “Alec,” Robert says. “Sit down.”

Alec does as he’s told. The silence is unbearable. “I’m sorry,” he bursts out, hating himself for saying it.

“You don’t need to apologize to me. No.” Robert sits down across from his, staring. “It’s your own life you’re ruining.”

“Father -”

“Please let me speak, Alec. And then you may respond.”

Alec nods.

“I don’t know if this was a one time...incident. Or if this is the lifestyle you truly want for yourself. I don’t really care. But I need to make sure you’ve thought this decision through all the way.”

“I’m not - ” he starts again.

Robert holds up one finger and Alec falls silent, chastised.

“You are making your life very, very difficult. Putting aside my career, and the rest of our family’s - you know Uncle David is facing strong opposition for Governor this year  - this will severely impact your future in politics. Everything will be twice as hard for you. And not just in your career - don’t you want to get married, have a family? A normal life? And it’s simply not safe. Why expose yourself to these type of risks?”

“May I speak now?” Alec says.

Robert inclines his head.

“I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I would never do anything to hurt you or the family.”

“But you already have, Alec.”

“I know that. But. But...this is who I am -”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sorry?”

“I said ‘are you sure?’” Robert repeats. “Why commit yourself to this now? You’re very young, you have no idea what kind of women you’ll meet in your life. There’s no need to give up like this.”

“I’m not -” Alec stutters, “I’m not giving up -”

Robert continues as if he hadn’t heard. “And truly Alec, this Magnus character seems very unsavory. If you were serious about this, we could have done it properly, we could have rolled it out in a way that allowed us to control the narrative. If we were Democrats, even, I could make this work. Maybe name some legislation after you, or something. But it just doesn’t look good, Alec.”

“Doesn’t _look_ good? This is my life, this isn’t about image, or politics, or -”

“You are a Lightwood, Alec. Your life is politics.”

Alec bites his lip. He feels childish, stupid and small and ashamed.

“What did Mother say?” Alec asks.

“She agrees with me, of course.  We’re not homophobic, Alec, truly. It’s not about that. You know we just want what’s best for you. That’s all we’ve ever wanted, for all of you.”

“What is it about?” Alec asks.

“It is about optics. And it is about you, making a decision that affects every single one of us and actively hurts you. That’s what it’s about. You do not operate in a vacuum, Alexander, not with this last name.”

Alec looks away. He wishes he were back home, back in his room, back with Jace. God, he wishes Jace were here. Finally, he just nods, wanting it to be over and done with.

“I have arranged some - uh, image rehabilitation. I’m sure you recall Lydia Branwell.”

“The Mayor’s daughter?” Alec asks.

“Yes. I’ve spoke with Mayor Branwell and we’ve arranged everything. The two of you will go on a series of dates, which will be well photographed and documented.”

“I’m not doing that,” Alec says.

“Alec -”

“You want me to lie?” he demands.

“No. I do not. You do not have to really date this girl, or develop feelings for her. I don’t care if you ever truly love a woman in your life. What I want is for you to make the decision to help yourself. To help me, and the rest of the family. For your mother, and for Isabelle.”

Alec sighs.

“You don’t have to decide about Lydia right now. We can discuss that later. But I need to know that you understand.”

“What do you want me to do?” Alec says, wearily.

“I want you to never see that boy again. And I want you to spend at least a year truly thinking about this. If this is what you really want your life to look like. Don’t rush into something you can’t take back. And consider Lydia. It’s a wonderful opportunity, for both of you.”

“Okay,” Alec says. “Okay.”

***

“Okay?!” Izzy shrieks. “What do you mean it’s okay!?”

Izzy is in his bedroom. She wants the full rundown on what Father had said to him, where they had left things. She’s outraged, which Alec finds exhausting. He appreciates it, really, her anger on his behalf. But it’s misplaced. Father hadn’t been cruel, hadn’t said anything that wasn’t true. He had simply stated his case and left it up to Alec to decide what he wanted to do about it.

“Izzy please, I’m really tired. I just want to go to bed.”

Izzy softens, all the fight going out of her. “I’m sorry, Al. About all of this.”

“Thank you. But it’s my life. I can handle it.”

She looks at him, her face unreadable. Then she crosses to his bed and hugs him, tightly. He returns her embrace slightly, not letting himself really fall into it. He’s afraid he’ll start crying if he does and he really doesn’t have time for that right now. “I just need to sleep, Izzy,” he says again.

She nods and lets go of him, slipping out of the room. He feels like his brain is on cruise control. He dials Mangus, pacing over to the bay window.

“Hey,” Magnus answers. “You doing alright?”

“Yeah. Sorry to call so late.”

“It’s only 11, Alec,” Magnus laughs.

That seems impossible, the day has lasted years.

“Listen, I need to talk to you,” Alec starts.

“Did you get shit for the pictures? I’m really sorry -”

“No. It’s okay. Seriously. It’s not your fault. But I think I need to - you know, take some space. For a little while at least.”

Magnus doesn’t say anything, so Alec just keeps talking. “It’s nothing you did, nothing at all. I really like you. I just think it makes sense right now, for us to maybe not see each other. Until this whole thing can settle down and blow over.”

“Okay. So is this you talking? Or your dad?” Magnus says, finally.

“No. It’s not about him. Or you, really. It’s just me. I just...I think I moved too fast.”

“Alexander, if you feel like I pushed you -”

“No. No. Nothing like that. Honest. You were - you were perfect. I just need to take a little time to catch my breath. You know. I’m not sure I can handle the spotlight like you.”

“Okay. If that’s really what you want,” Magnus’s voice sounds clipped.

“It is. I mean, it’s not, but it’s just - it’s too hard right now.”

Magnus laughs hollowly. “This is never not going to be hard for you. But I guess if you want to pretend -”.

“I don’t. And I’m not. I just need to think about my family. About what this means for them.”

Magnus exhales slowly. “You know, I didn’t really expect you to fight for us. That’s okay. But I had hoped you would at least fight for yourself.”

“Magnus -”

“I guess it’s none of my business.”

“Bit of a hypocrite, aren’t you?” Alec demands. “You weren’t exactly living as a proud member of the gay community. That’s why all of this happened, didn’t it? Why I got caught up in this?”

“I think this conversation has reached the end of it’s productivity, as you’re clearly no longer talking about things you understand. Goodbye, Alexander.”

He hangs up. Alec stands in the middle of the room. Well. Now it was done. He looks at his phone properly, for the first time in hours. Nine missed calls, thirty-six text messages, eighteen facebook messages, and two voicemails. God he’s tired. He looks around the bedroom, feeling lost in its echoing emptiness.

Slowly, Alec walks through the passageway into Jace’s room. It’s empty too, of course, but Alec, almost in a daze, pulls off his shirt and jeans and climbs into Jace’s bed. He tucks the covers up around him, the piney scent of Jace’s aftershave enveloping him. He closes his eyes for a moment, letting himself pretend Jace is there, that Jace is coming to help him. And then he opens his phone and makes himself go through every single message. Some are friends of Izzy, asking to meet Magnus. A few are his friends, sending vaguely confused but supportive messages. There’s one from an old high school friend with some very specific instructions regarding the Biblical punishments for homosexuality. He deletes that one. A boy Jace used to box with tagged him in nineteen pictures of gay porn on Instagram. He removes the tags and deletes his Instagram, but keeps going until he’s opened everything. Then he opens the voicemails. The first is from his friend Oak, at Harvard, asking if Alec needs anything and saying he’s proud of him. A very large lump rises in Alec’s throat. He hasn’t done a single thing to be proud of. The second is from Magnus. He plays it.

“Hey Alexander, it’s me. Just checking in. Sorry I had to jump off the phone earlier, but you know how terrifying publicists are. Wanted to see how you were doing and apologize again. I wish I could have protected you from this, uh, but I really like you and I hope this doesn’t mess things up for you. Or for us. Because I think you’re pretty great. I have to go to London for work next week and I think you should probably come with me. Okay. Hope you’re okay. Call me later. Bye, babe.”

Alec plays the message through twice more and then deletes it, tossing his phone away towards the foot of the bed. He doesn’t want to look at it ever again. He curls up in Jace’s sheets, screwing his eyes shut against the tears that are finally threatening to fall, and feeling more thoroughly disgusted with himself than he had at any point in the Senator’s office.

 

**Jace, 20**

When Jace wakes up, it takes him a moment to remember where he is, to realize that this wasn’t actually a dream. The guest bedroom of his father’s house feels foreign, but slowly it all catches up to him. He had slept fitfully, the self-conscious rest of someone sleeping in an unfamiliar home that doesn’t feel entirely safe yet.

He rolls over to check his phone, and sees message notifications for the group chat with Alec and Izzy. He sighs. Alec and Izzy. The strength of his connection to them feels like an open wound right now; he doesn’t want to touch it, or look at it too closely. His relationship with them was built on a fundamental lie. He knows Alec and Izzy would do anything for him, but this world - Michael, the drugs, his birthright - they wouldn’t understand. He can’t carry them with him here. Jace is uninterested in the legality of his father’s career, but he knows it would be hard for the law-abiding, God-fearing Lightwood siblings to wrap their heads around. Michael’s version of teaching morality to Jace was to instruct him that what was right was anything you did to stay alive, and everything else was a gray area. That was pretty much it. Alec, always hyped on his Constitutional Ethics seminar, had subjected Jace to God knows how many speeches about how the _law is the law, the law is hard, but it’s our duty, no, our privilege, to interpret it correctly_. Something like that. Jace generally didn’t listen. In his world, the rules of the game were always changing, and he knew the law depended on who you were and what you had to offer.

He writes a text to them quickly “ _gonna stay down here for a little. wanna get to know my dad. im ok but plz dont call_ ”. He sends it before he can feel bad about it, then gets up and heads downstairs.

Michael is in the kitchen, flipping an omelette at the stove. “Jace! I was just about to come wake you up. Breakfast is ready!”

Jace stares at his father. He’s so upbeat, gregariously charming, it catches Jace off guard.

“Well, sit down! Do you want coffee?” Michael asks.

Jace nods. “Yes, please. But I can get it.”

“Oh no, you sit down.” Michael pours him a mug of coffee, and then slides the omelettes on to two plates and passes Jace his. “I hope you like eggs.” 

“Yeah. I do. Thanks.” Jace says, taking a sip of coffee.

Michael sits down across from him and looks at Jace for a long moment. “I just can’t believe you’re here, son,” he says.

Jace smiles. “Me too.”

“I want you to come with me today. Meet my crew, learn a little about what your old man does. How’s that sound?”

“Great,” says Jace, taking a bite of his omelette. “This is really good, thank you.”

“You don’t need those fancy manners here, Jace. This isn’t Maryse Lightwood’s house. No need for all that fake shit.”

“Okay.” Jace takes another bite of his eggs. Michael isn’t eating.

“So. What did Maryse tell you about me? They try to turn you against your own father?” Michael’s voice is casual, jokey, but there’s an edge to it that belies menace towards Maryse.

“Nothing, really.” Jace says, uncomfortable. “They never really talked to me about you.”

“Mm,” Michael says.

“Maryse talked about my mom sometimes,” Jace goes on, and Michael looks up at him. “She sounds really incredible.”

Michael smiles. “She was. She was the best thing that ever happened to me.”

“I wish I had gotten to know her.”

“She loved you. Very much. I remember she used to play this game with you when you were three, maybe, this peek-a-boo clapping game? I don’t know. But you loved it. And every time you laughed she would crack up. Like it was the best thing she had ever heard.”

Jace stares at his father, trying to soak up his words. This was a door he generally kept shut - with no memories of his mother, he missed her in a way that mostly felt abstract. He missed the idea of mother, the thought of having one all to himself. But that was it. Yet here was Michael, filling in the blanks, painting a picture of the life that had been taken from him.

“Oh!” Michael says. “I have something you might want.” Michael ducks out of the kitchen, returning a moment later with an old photo. It shows a laughing red-haired woman - his mother, Celine, looking barely older than he is now - standing in front of a somewhat dingy Christmas tree, a baby in each hand. Jace is two or so, perched on her hip and waving his fists at the camera. A redheaded bundle in the other hand must be Clarissa. Something very heavy shifts in Jace’s chest. “Take it,” Michael says. “You should have it.”

“Really?” Jace asks. He only has one photo from his childhood, the one of him and Michael at a park, that he keeps in his room at the Lightwoods. “Thank you,” he says.

“Of course. I wish I had more to give you.”

Jace shrugs. “I still just can’t believe it.”

Michael puts his hand on Jace’s shoulder. “I only hope that one day you’ll be able to understand. And that you’ll find it in you to forgive me.”

“There’s nothing to forgive,” Jace says instantly.

There’s a knock at the door.

“Oh, that’ll be Lyle,” Michael says. “Get dressed, son. We’ve got work to do.”

Michael goes to answer the door and Jace follows him, holding tight to the photo.

Michael lets in a tall guy, maybe Alec’s height, with shoulder length brown hair. Jace presumes this is Lyle. He’s got a kind of hungry look about him that puts Jace on guard.

“Lyle,” Michael says, “meet my son.”

Lyle looks at him appraisingly. Jace stares him down. Finally, Lyle extends a hand to shake.

“Nice to meet the mythical Jace Wayland,” Lyle says.

“Lyle is my right hand man. Ain’t you, Lyle?”

Michael’s always had a shadow of a Southern drawl, but upon Lyle’s arrival it’s suddenly become pronounced.

“Cool,” says Jace. “I’ll go get dressed.”

Back upstairs, Jace sorts through his clothes. He decides against the Comme des Garcons tee shirt he’d stolen from Alec last year. He doubts his father and Lyle even know what Comme des Garcons is, but still. He’d rather not imagine what Michael would say if he saw his son wearing a $300 tee shirt. He didn’t bring much with him, just what he could fit in his backpack. He should probably pick up some more shit. Although he’ll have to stop using his Lightwood family credit card. He doesn’t need their charity anymore. By extension he supposes he’d have to give them back the vast majority of his bank account if he‘s going to go down that road. Maybe he will. He wants to settle his debt to them, the debt he sometimes finds too enormous to comprehend. Maybe he can earn some money working for Michael. Jace throws on some clothes and heads out, the sound of his father laughing uproariously at something Lyle’s said reaching him from downstairs.

***

It turns out the Michael Wayland brand includes a bar with an expansive basement, which is apparently the hub of his drug empire. It really does seem to be an empire; Michael apparently has a hand in everything that goes on in Nashville.

He leaves Jace in the basement with Lyle, who’s counting Oxy tablets to be distributed to the dealers in his father’s employe. There’s something nagging in his stomach as he sits, straddling a chair backwards. He ignores it.

“Want help?” Jace offers.

Lyle shakes his head without looking away from the tablets. Finally, he seems to feel Jace staring, because he pushes his long brown hair out of his eyes and looks up at him. “So. You’re really Michael’s boy.”

“Yep.”

“Huh.”

“You got a problem with that?” Jace asks, palms twitching.

“Nope. Just never actually believed you were real.”

“My dad talk about me?” Jace asks, trying to feign disinterest.

“Time to time, sure.”

Jace wonders what Michael would say about him, but Lyle doesn’t seem particularly inclined to answer questions. “So what do you do for him?”

“Little of everything.”

“Clears it up, thanks,” Jace says sarcastically.

Lyle finally looks up from the bottles he’s emptying.

“Listen boy. Your daddy might be happy to give you the keys to his kingdom after all this time, but I don’t know shit about you. So I don’t trust you. Got it?

Jace cocks his head in agreement. “That’s fine. It’s really all the same to me.”

“You boys playing nice?” Michael says as he descends the stairs.

Lyle smirks at him. Michael puts his hand on Jace’s shoulder, and Jace feels a surge of pride at the simple gesture. _My father_ , he thinks.

“You know, Lyle, Jace here is a boxer.”

“Mhm,” Lyle says, returning to the bottles.

“I’d like to see how you two do against each other.”

Jace laughs.

“I’m serious,” says Michael. “Let’s go out back.”

“You want me to fight him?” Jace says.

Lyle stands up. “Why not?”

Jace assess him. He can take this guy. Lyle has a scrappy, slightly feral look about him, but he’s lean and slight. If Jace is confident in one thing, it’s the solidity of his body, the reliability of his strength. He stands up too. “Okay.”

There’s a patio out back, and a grassy patch. Michael nods at it. “Lemme get the boys, they’ll wanna see this.” He ducks back inside.

Jace takes his shirt off, stretching his arms. It’s hot already, the air dripping with humidity. With his back to Jace, Lyle pulls his shirt over his head and Jace recoils slightly at the Confederate flag tattoo emblazoned on his shoulder. Well. At least he won’t feel bad about hitting him really hard.

“Need to wrap your hands, Harvard?” Lyle asks.

“No,” Jace says, although he knows Coach Gamble would smack him for fucking up his hands for no reason.

Michael comes back out with four of the other guys who work for him. Jace had been introduced to them, but he’d already forgotten their names. One of them is called Daryl, he remembers, but he’s not sure which. They’re all strung out and smudged looking, somehow. “Alright boys,” Michael calls, ebullient, “put on a show for us.”

Lyle cracks his neck, and takes a step towards Jace. Jace pulls his shoulders back, warming up his feet, getting ready. And then Lyle throws the first punch.

Jace’s cheek splits open, the familiar burning sensation of skin breaking and then the flow of warm blood. He can hear the men cheering and jeering as he swipes at his face angrily, wiping away the blood.

“Sorry, were you waiting for a ref? Wanna tell daddy I’m not playing fair?” Lyle taunts.

Jace spits. Lyle is right; he wasn’t ready and he’s kicking himself. He hasn’t fought against someone who actually wanted to hurt him, not just advance in the NCBA rankings, in forever, and he knows it shows.

“Probably should have mentioned, Jace,” Michael calls out. “Lyle handles collections for us. If you beat him, you can have his job.”

Jace takes a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down and focus, to slip into wherever it is he goes in his brain when he’s fighting. Everything sort of mutes out around him; he can hear only his own breathing, see only the body of his opponent. He goes on the offensive, sending a rapid spray of blows at Lyle. He blocks most of them easily, but now they’re dancing.

Lyle’s good, but he’s undisciplined. He drops his hands, keeps his feet too close together. He also doesn’t play by the rules. He gets Jace in the neck with an elbow strike he doesn’t see coming, causing Jace’s airway to spasm painfully. He coughs but catches himself before Lyle can gain the advantage and presses forward. The taunts of the men watching, of his father, are fuzzy, and Jace hears only Lyle’s heavy breathing as Jace parries forward, over and over.

Finally, Lyle breaks, taking a step back, and Jace seizes the opening, landing a right uppercut. He feels Lyle’s nose crack under his hand, and his own knuckles split open from the force of the impact. Lyle stumbles backwards, spitting up blood. Michael roars with approval, and all the sound and light and color comes rushing back into the world. Jace bends over, catching his breath. His cheek is still bleeding from that first hit, and somewhere along the way he split his left hand too. He walks over and extends his hand to Lyle.

But Lyle wipes the blood from his face savagely. “We’re not done,” Lyle says.

“Seriously?” Jace says, still breathing hard.

In answer, Lyle swings his leg up in a kick to Jace’s ribs. Okay then. Jace resets, trying to shake the blood from his hand. Michael is laughing, delighted. Lyle’s breath is ragged, there’s no way he can sustain this. They lock in again. Jace knows he just has to wait it out. He goes on the defensive, staying close to Lyle with his hands up to block.

“You not gonna hit me?” Lyle yells. “Fucking pussy.”

Jace answers with a quick jab series, but then falls back into a defensive position again. Lyle’s spinning out, he’s almost there. He lets him land a hard hook on Jace’s already open cheek. It stings bitterly, but the second Lyle drops his hands, gloating about his hit, Jace slams him in the chest with a kick. Lyle falls back, coughing and choking on the blood which still streams freely from his nose. He snarls at Jace and tries to stand back up, but he stumbles. Jace stares at Lyle, unwavering. He can hear Michael yelling something, but he doesn’t look away from Lyle until Lyle finally breaks, shaking his head and looking down as he pinches his nose. Then Jace steps back and looks for Michael.

A few his father’s men have gone to Lyle, trying to take a look at his nose, but he waves them off. Lyle still only has eyes for Jace, and his face is hard. Livid.

But then Michael throws his arm around Jace, raising one of his fists like they’re in the ring. “Looks like you’re out of a job, Lyle!” Michael laughs, clapping Jace on the back. The look on his father’s face - so full of triumph - is better than anything Jace ever dreamed of.

 

**Alec, 18**

Alec leans back in his desk chair to look at his handiwork. If he’s being honest with himself, he’s pretty sure he could get into Harvard early admission, but he can’t commit to a school until he finds out if Jace got in there too, so he figures he might as well cast a wide net. He’s got his nine applications color coded, a corresponding calendar with deadlines for each school on his whiteboard. He should probably just do one for Jace too, or else there’s a very real chance Jace will simply decide not to do his apps. Although he thinks that if Jace decided he was going to just charm his way into Harvard, he could probably get away with it. He wouldn’t put it past him.

Alec’s phone rings, the caller ID lighting up with Izzy’s name. Weird. He thought she was home. “Are you calling me from your bedroom?” he asks with a laugh.

“Is this Alec Lightwood?” It’s a girl’s voice, unfamiliar. Not Izzy.

“Yeah. Who’s this? Where’s Izzy?”

“Yeah, um. You should come get her.”

“What? Where are you? Is she okay?” Alec stands up so quickly his chair falls backwards, clattering to the ground.

“We’re at a party. She’s, like, really fucked up, dude.”

“Fuck. Okay. I’m coming. I’m coming right now,” he says, panic rising in his stomach. “Where are you?”

“Uhh. That guy Andy’s place?” the girl says. She sounds further away, like she’s losing focus.

“Hey, hey, hold on. I need the address. Can you text me the address?” Alec can hear voices shouting in the background, music blaring. The girl is saying something to someone else at the party, her voice muffled.  “Hello? Please, are you still there?”

“I gotta go,” she says.

“Wait no - “

“Get here fast.”

And then she hangs up. Alec stares at his phone for a moment. He’s crushed by an impotent sense of panic - Izzy is in trouble, Izzy needs him, and he has absolutely no idea where to find her. Fuck. He needs Jace. Alec runs into the passage, throwing the door into Jace’s room open. “Jace!”

He’s so distracted that it takes him a moment to process what’s going on. Jace is in bed, his muscular back to Alec as he holds himself up on his forearms. There’s a naked girl is under him. They’re definitely having sex.

Alec stands there, dumbstruck as Jace moans, lowering his mouth to her neck. The girl turns her head and opens her eyes.

“Um,” she says. “I think your brother wants to join us.”

Jace looks up. “Alec, seriously? Now?” He gestures at the girl, exasperated, but he looks like he’s trying not to laugh.

“It’s Izzy. She needs us.”

Jace sits up abruptly. “What happened?”

“We have to find her. Some girl called me, said she’s really fucked up at some party and we need to come get her. Right now.”

“Shit,” Jace hops out of bed and Alec turns away, blushing deeply. “I’m sorry,” Jace is saying to the girl. “I gotta go.”

“It’s cool. I love Izzy, I hope she’s okay,” she says.

Alec turns back around to look at her. “Do you go to Sacred Heart?”

“Yeah. We have French together. And calculus,” she says with a sigh.

Jace has his pants on, so Alec comes over to the bed. “Listen, do you have any idea what party she might be at tonight? The girl mentioned someone named Andy?”

The girl sits up in bed, letting the sheet fall to her waist. She’s apparently unconcerned with Alec’s presence. “Hmm. It could be Andy Cooper? Hallie West’s boyfriend. He’s way older so he, like, has his own house. They have a lot of parties. Where’s my phone? I’ll check Facebook.”

Jace tosses a cell phone to her. “You’re the best, Ella.”

She waves him off, scrolling through her phone. “Yep. It’s totally Andy Cooper. Raleigh, Hallie’s twin sister, does ballet with Izzy so it for sure makes sense for her to be there. I’m sending you a screenshot of the event page, Jace.”

Jace pulls a sweatshirt over his head and bends to kiss her. “Thank you.”

Alec doesn’t look away this time.

“Okay,” Jace says, straightening. “Let’s go.”

Alec turns to leave, but remembers himself and looks back to Ella. “Thank you. Seriously.”

“No problem. That offer to join stands, by the way. For next time,” Ella says, winking at him.

Jace shakes his head at her. “You’re a menace to society.”

She shrugs, and Alec decides it’s high time to shut this whole thing down so he grabs Jace’s arm and drags him out of the bedroom.

Jace drives, Alec navigating on his phone. Andy Cooper’s house is in the suburbs, so it takes them fifteen minutes to get there. Alec is anxious, chewing his lip.

“She told us to hurry,” he says again.

“I’m already going 85. Trust me, if I could go faster on these roads, I would.”

“I know,” Alec says. “Sorry.”

“It’s okay. We’re going to get her. I’m sure she just drank too much. We’ll get her home and she’ll be fine in the morning,” Jace says, although Alec knows Jace’s bluffing voice when he hears it.

“Turn right on Bedford, quarter of a mile,” he says. “We’re four minutes away.”

“You know Izzy’s tough as shit. She can beat both of us up,” Jace reminds him.

Alec laughs flatly. “True. You taught her well.”

They pull into the circular driveway, the house looming large over it. People are clearly there, all the lights are on, but it seems quiet for a party. No thumping bass or Solo cups. Jace and Alec exchange a look, and Jace kills the engine.

The front door is unlocked and Jace pushes it open. Alec follows. Immediately, he hears yelling. Almost running, Alec and Jace follow the noise to the living room, where they find a loose circle of ten or so people standing around Izzy and some guy. He’s definitely in his thirties, as are most of the guys in the room. All the girls are teenagers. Alec’s stomach turns.

“You think you’re sooooo fucking important that you can just do whatever you want and we’ll all thank you for it?!” Izzy is yelling at the guy. Her speech is slurred, and she’s bent over a little, like she can’t properly hold herself up. She’s clearly far past drunk.

The guy she’s yelling at approaches her, hands up. “Baby, come on, you totally got it wrong.” Slowly, he puts his hands on her shoulders, like he’s trying to bring a feral animal in. And then Izzy slaps him, hard across the face, and he stumbles backwards. The girls all scream, and a couple of the guys rush in to separate them. Alec shoves everyone aside, trying to get to his sister.

“I got her, I got her,” Alec says, waving off one of the guys holding her. Izzy is barely upright, her eyes drooping shut.

“Alec?” she says, confused. “Fuck are you doing here?”

“Taking you home,” Alec says, putting his arm around her. Jace comes to her other side, grabbing her arm.

“FUCK you guys,” Izzy says, shoving both of them off her. “Leave me alone.” She stumbles away from them, towards the guy she slapped. “I’m sorry, Rafe, come here, baby.”

The boy puts his arms around her waist, and she kisses his face where she’d slapped him. “I’m sorry, baby, I’m sorry,” she repeats.

“Let’s get out of here,” the guy, Rafe, says, holding Izzy tighter.

“Dude, she’s clearly fucked up,” Jace says, taking a step towards Rafe. “Let us take her home.”

“I don’t think she wants to go with you, do you, babe?”

“No,” Izzy says petulantly, falling into Rafe. She’s drunk, definitely, but Alec thinks shes also on something else, the way her eyes are fluttering into the back of her head.

“Izzy,” Alec starts, taking a step to stand next to Jace.

“You’re not my dad, just fucking leave me alone,” Izzy says, burying her face in Rafe’s chest.

“I think it’s time for us to go,” Rafe says. “You kids have a good night.”

“C’mon man, you’re gonna take a fucked up girl home? She’s underage, dude, she’s seventeen,” Jace says.

“Who the fuck are you supposed to be?” Rafe asks. Izzy sways, her knees almost buckling under her.

“Okay, I’m done with this.” Jace says. He takes two big steps, closing the space between him and Rafe, and in a maneuver too quick for Alec to really track, he pins Rafe’s arm behind him, forcing him to release Izzy. Jace kicks him in the back of the knees and he goes down.

Jace picks up Izzy, who’s screeching, fighting him. “Stop it! Stop it! Fuck you Jace, put me down.” She’s still struggling, but Jace lets her punches land on his back as he lifts her over his shoulder and turns back to Alec.

Rafe pulls himself back up, bent over, hands on his knees. “It’s not my fault you’ve got a crazy whore sister.”

Jace freezes.

“Jace, no. We’re going,” Alec says, knowing all too well what the placid look in Jace’s eyes portends. Jace passes Izzy, who’s barely able to keep herself upright, to Alec. She’s squirming against him, but Alec puts his arm around her tightly, watching Jace. His jaw set, Jace turns back to Rafe.

“Say that again?” Jace says, calmly.

“You’ve got a crazy whore sister. She’s fucked every dude in this room. Bet she’d fuck you too, if you asked. She’s kind of a freak like that.”

Jace coldcocks him and Rafe goes down flat on his back, but Jace isn’t done. He straddles Rafe and punches him, again and again.

“Jace! That’s enough!’ Alec says. Rafe’s lip has split open and there’s blood on Jace’s knuckles.

“I’m gonna call the cops,” one of the girls says. Alec thinks it might have been the girl who called him originally.

“Jace. Stop it.” Alec says. “Please.”

Jace stops. He’s breathing heavily, still leaning over Rafe. “You’re pathetic,” Jace says, voice thick with disgust. “She’s a fucking kid.” He punches him one more time, then heaves himself up.

He walks back to Alec and Izzy. Izzy had temporarily forgotten to be struggling, engrossed in watching the fight, but now she remembers and turns on Jace anew. “Fuck you, Jace,” she says again, shoving him.  

“Yes, we’ve heard,” Jace says, picking Izzy up over his shoulder in a fireman’s lift and turning to go. Alec follows him, the party completely silent around them.

Alec sits in the back with Izzy, who’s silent during the ride. Jace drives, going the speed limit now, his split knuckles white on the steering wheel.

“Pull over,” Izzy says. “Gonna throw up.”

Jace does, and Alec holds back her dark curls as she throws up on the side of the road. Jace leans against the car, arms crossed.

Izzy’s crying softly, dry heaving now. Alec rubs her back. “You’re okay, Iz. You’re gonna be okay.”

She sits down in the dirt on the side of the road, distressingly close to her pile of vomit. Her legs splay out in front of her and she’s not crying so much as whimpering now. It breaks Alec’s heart.

“I’m not your baby sister anymore,” she says finally. “You can’t protect me.”

Alec squats down next to her, profoundly wishing they were having this conversation in the car rather than on the shoulder of the road. Sighing, Jace sits down on the other side of her.

“We know you’re not a baby, Iz. But you needed help. That guy is a piece of shit.”

Izzy half laughs, half sobs. “I know.”

“He’s not your boyfriend, is he?” Alec asks.

Izzy shakes her head. “It’s not true. What he said. I haven’t fucked all those guys.”

Alec tucks her hair behind her ear. “That’s not what we care about, Izzy. You can have sex with whoever you want to, that’s none of our business.” Jace nods in agreement. “But none of them should be taking you home when you’re this out of it. That’s not right.”

“We know you don’t need us to protect you,” Jace says, rubbing their sister’s back. “You’re capable, and smart, we know that. But why are you even hanging out with those guys, Iz? You’re so much better than them.”

“What do you guys care?” Izzy says, hiccuping.

“What are you talking about, of course we care,” Jace says.

“No you don’t. No one cares what I do. Father only cares about Alec, Mother only cares about me when someone’s taking pictures. And you two have each other. Nobody needs me. Nobody cares what I want.”

“What do you want?” Alec says. “Tell us.”

Izzy starts to cry again. “I don’t know! I want - I want…” She trails off.

“It’s okay,” Jace says. “I don’t know what I want either.”

Izzy looks at him, turning on a dime the way only drunk girls can. “I love you so much Jace, I’m sorry I hit you.”

“It’s okay,” Jace smiles.

“I love you too, Alec,” Izzy says, careening into her brother in an attempt at a hug. He puts his arm around her.

“We know,” Alec says soothingly.

“But you’re both gonna leave me,” she says.

“No we’re not,” Jace objects.

“You are. You’re going to go to college together and you’re going to leave me alone in this stupid fucking house. I’m all alone.”

Jace grabs her hand. “Hey. You are _never_ alone. Okay?”

“Even when we go to school,” Alec says, “you’re stuck with us. We’re your brothers, Izzy. We’re always going to have your back.”

“Even when you don’t want us to,” Jace adds.

Izzy smiles, swaying a little. Then she pitches forward, throwing up again all over her dress.

“Andddd there it is,” Jace says, shaking flecks of vomit from his hand.

“Let’s go home,” Alec suggests.

They lay Izzy down in the backseat, her head in Alec’s lap. Jace drives slowly all the way home. Father is in DC, and Alec assumes Mother took her sleeping pill and passed out hours ago, so Jace carries Izzy in through the front door.

“Let’s take her to my room?” Alec asks. Jace nods. She’s all but passed out in Jace’s arms.

“What should we do about her dress?” Alec says, raising his eyebrows at Jace once they’ve shut the door to Alec’s room.

“I’ll take it to get dry cleaned tomorrow. Let’s get her out of it. Get me a sweatshirt or something.”

Alec turns his back, feeling it’s marginally more appropriate for Jace to undress Izzy than for him to. He goes to his dresser and pulls out an oversized sweatshirt, which he throws over his shoulder towards the bed.

“Jesus, Alec, you’re not going to die if you see your sister in a bra.”

“Being proper,” Alec mutters vaguely.

“No offense, brother, but I think that ship sailed a long time ago for the three of us. You just watched me having sex with Ella.”

“I did _not_ watch,” Alec says hotly, turning back around.

“Mhh-hm,” Jace says, but he seems unbothered. “Can you get me a damp washcloth?”

Alec goes into his bathroom to do as he’s told. “I didn’t watch, it just took me a second - I was worrying about Izzy…” He’s finding this whole line of conversation very upsetting. But he’s also intrigued by Jace’s tone. Which sounds...jokey. Flirty, even.

Alec goes back into the bedroom and starts wiping up Izzy’s face and neck. “I can do it,” Izzy says, eyes closed.

“Shh,” Jace says.

“You don’t have to do everything alone, Izzy.” Alec says. “There’s no prize for that.”

Alec feels Jace staring at him, and looks up into his brother’s eyes. Jace smiles.

“What?” Alec says.

“Nothing.” Jace runs his fingers through Izzy’s hair. “Listen to your brother, Isabelle. He can be very smart sometimes.”

Alec blushes. They tuck Izzy into bed, laying her on her side, and she’s asleep before they can pull the blankets up.

“We should watch her,” Jace says. “I’ll stay in here with you.”

Alec nods. “What do you think she was on?"

“Dunno. Ketamine, maybe? And tequila, based on her vomit.”

“Gross,” Alec says. “What is she doing taking ketamine with a bunch of thirty year old guys?”

Jace shakes his head. “I should have fucking killed that Rafe guy. What kind of name is _Rafe_.”

He and Alec are sitting side by side on the bed, watching Izzy sleep. “British, I think. Or Scandinavian. And, um, no you shouldn’t have,” Alec says, turning to Jace.

“Not _literally_ ,” Jace clarifies, although Alec doesn’t totally believe him.

“I’m glad you beat him up,” Alec confesses.

“I’m glad you stopped me.” Jace says, quietly.

“That’s what I’m here for,” Alec says.

“To pull me back?”

Alec nods. “Always.”

They’re quiet for a moment.

“And to watch me having sex,” Jace says.

“Oh my god, seriously Jace, that is NOT what happened,” Alec says, punching his brother in the arm. “Do not go around telling people that, you liar.”

Jace just laughs, and the two of them sit there. “You can sleep, if you want,” Jace says. “I’m not tired.”

“It’s okay,” Alec says. “Me neither.”

They sit in easy, amicable silence for a few minutes. Izzy sleeps, and Alec wonders if she’s right. If he and Jace have neglected her. The two of them do get caught up in their own little world sometimes, he knows that. And the intensity of their bond has been primary in his life since the day they met. But still. Izzy is his sister, their sister. She didn’t have to go take ketamine and fuck guys twice her age if she was feeling left out.

He turns to Jace. “How do you know so much about drugs?”

“Hm?” Jace says, apparently lost in his own thoughts.

“About different kinds, and shit. Like how’d you know she took ketamine.”

“My dad did a lot of drugs,” Jace says, not looking at him.

“What?”

“Yeah.” Jace’s voice is measured, distant.

“I never knew that,” Alec says, shocked.

Jace shrugs. “I don’t really like to think about it.”

Alec waits, knowing Jace will say more when he’s ready.

“I dunno. Drugs were always around, you know? I kind of just thought that was normal. It wasn’t until I was older, really, living with you guys, that I put the pieces together. Understood just how much he was doing. But he really wasn’t a bad guy. He loved me, so much. I know that. I didn’t even really get it till I was older, like I said, because it didn’t affect me that much, ya know?”

“What did he use?” Alec asks.

“Meth, mostly. But heroin too, I think.”

“Jesus. I’m so sorry.”

“It’s okay. He wasn’t an addict, or anything like that. He was a really good dad.”

“I know,” Alec assures him. “But still -”

“Yeah. There was a couple times I remember - I didn’t know then, you know, but now, I can guess - that he was really using.”

Alec nods, both hoping and fearing that Jace will go on. Jace still hasn’t looked up from Izzy.

“This one time...” Jace takes a deep breath, and then steamrolls through the next bit, like he’s trying to get it out of his mouth before he can change his mind. “He killed my dog.”

“What!?” Alec almost yells.

“Shhh, don’t wake her up.”

“What the _fuck_ , Jace?”

Jace shrugs. “He didn’t kill it in front of me,” he says. As if that helped. Alec waits. Jace starts speaking again, and his inflectionless tone frightens Alec. “I had found this puppy, this pit bull, in our neighborhood. It was when we lived in Brooklyn. My dad said I could keep it if I trained it. I was only like, seven or eight, maybe, and obviously I didn’t know shit about training dogs. But I loved that thing. I just wanted to hold it, all the time. I think I ditched school a couple of days just because I couldn’t leave it.”

Alec half-smiles, imagining that easily.

“But it was a puppy, from the street and shit, so it wasn’t even housebroken. And when it had an accident in the house one night, my dad kind of kicked it around. It was awful. I started crying, and he told me that was the only way to train a dog. You had to show it who the boss was. Make it afraid of you. He made me promise I would train it properly, start beating it and shit.”

“Jesus.”

“Yeah. And I promised I would, but of course I couldn’t bring myself to do it. Then a few nights later, the dog pissed in the house, when my dad was home. And I remember just being fucking terrified, like, so terrified of what he was going to do to it. But he didn’t do anything. He just looked at me. And he told me to punish it.”

“What?” Alec breathes.

“He told me to hurt it. So it would learn. He screamed at me, and seriously, I thought about it. I fucking thought about it. But I couldn’t do it. So Michael just picked the dog up, and he took him outside, and then a few minutes later he came back in. And told me he had killed it.”

Alec stares. He knew where the story was heading, but still. “Fuck.”

“He told me he had killed it because I had ruined it. I didn’t deserve to have a pet if I wasn’t going to train him properly. He told me that I had destroyed it, by loving it. Loving something only destroys it, and then it destroys you too. So be careful what you love. That’s what he told me.”

“Fucking shit, Jace.” He doesn’t know what else to say.

“Yeah. Anyway, I think he was using a lot, at that time. I think being back in Brooklyn was bad for him. That’s where we lived when my mom and my sister died.” Jace shrugs.

“Maybe he didn’t really kill it. Maybe he just dumped it on the street, or something? And told you he had killed it?”

“Yeah. Maybe.” Jace says, but Alec can tell he’s saying it for him, not because he believes it.

“I’m sorry,” Alec says again, desperately wishing they could go back in time and adopt Jace earlier.

“It’s okay,” Jace says. “You should go to sleep. It’s too late for you to be up on a school night.”

“Hey, I’m capable of staying up late, okay,” Alec jokes, allowing Jace to change the subject.

Jace rolls his eyes. “Get your beauty sleep, princess. I’ll watch Izzy.”

Alec lays down because he can tell Jace wants to be alone now. “Wake me up if she needs me, okay?”

“Promise.”

Alec turns over and closes his eyes, feeling his heartbeat sync up to Jace’s steady breathing. He’s still reeling from Jace’s story. Poor Jace, who had seen so much darkness in the world, who had lost so much when he was only a boy. It could have made him hard and bitter. It _should_ have. It should have torn him apart. But it didn’t. It just made him good and kind. Fiercely loyal and protective and loving. He sees Jace punching Rafe over and over, carrying Izzy out of that house. He sees the way Jace’s body always shifts slightly, positioning himself as a barrier if he feels like someone is threatening Izzy or Alec or his friends or anyone he senses to be vulnerable. He’s seen Jace cross the street to walk with a woman who was being followed home. He’s seen him pick a fight with some cops who were harassing a homeless guy. The consummate protector. But no one had been there to protect him.

It takes Alec a very long time to fall asleep.

 

**Alec, 20**

In the dream, Jace is kissing him. No. In the dream, Jace is devouring him. Alec’s body is burning, and he can feel Jace’s touch everywhere. Jace is kissing him, biting at his lips, his neck, his stomach and Alec is arching his back to meet him, pressing against Jace’s bare skin. Jace is rough, uncompromising, and Alec wants him. God, he wants him. He wants Jace to destroy him, wants to offer up his body to him. He wants -

Alec wakes with a start, sweating in the humid room. He tries to catch his breath, clinging to the last traces of the dream even as it slips away from him, replaced by a sick feeling of shame. There’s an ache pulsing low in his stomach and he turns over to lay face down, his skin sticky with heat and self-loathing.

He’s known for a long time now that what he felt for Jace was more than what he had a right to feel. Maybe he’s always known. But he’s never dreamed of Jace this way before. It had felt so real, so visceral, so possible. _It isn’t_ he reminds himself. _Jace is your brother. Jace does not want you. Jace would be disgusted. Jace would hate you, if he knew. Besides, Jace was gone._

God. Now that the last traces of pleasure were ebbing from him, he feels nothing but disgust for himself. He had always kept this feeling on the periphery of his conscious, turning his head quickly whenever he caught sight of its edges. But Magnus had broken through the dam and now he was mired down in this swamp. He should never have let himself be with Magnus. He should never have started this, because now he was scared he couldn’t stop it. Father was disgusted with what he was already, if he knew the way Alec felt about his own brother - but Jace wasn’t really his brother, was he? They referred to each other that way, had lived in the same house for nine years, but they weren’t related. It wasn’t like he had feelings for Izzy, or something. No. There was no way to justify it. Even Izzy, who had stood shoulder to shoulder with him her entire life, would be horrified if she knew that he _wanted_ Jace. He had made a mistake by opening this door with Magnus and he intended to close it. Now. Permanently.

He rolls over and grabs his phone. He’s annoyed to still feel a flicker of hope that there will be a text from Jace waiting. _He doesn’t want to talk to you_ he reminds himself, wondering when it’s going to start hurting less. Since the day they’d met, Jace and Alec had faced everything together. But now Jace was with his father, his true family, and he had no use for Alec, let alone Alec’s sick fantasies. He was ending this. Tonight. He was doing it for himself but also for Jace and for Izzy and for the rest of the family. Before he can change his mind, he types out an email to the Senator’s secretary. “ _Send me Lydia’s number_. _Thanks._ ”

***

Alec pulls up in front of Lydia’s brownstone, exactly three minutes early for their first date. He’s been driving the extra Range Rover since Jace commandeered Alec’s BMW. He doesn’t particularly mind about the car, although he’s very confident it will not be returned in the condition it was stolen in. Jace is a notoriously bad driver. Alec half-smiles, thinking of the outraged denials Jace proffered whenever someone pointed this very obvious fact out.

Lydia, apparently, is also timely, because she knocks on the passenger seat window and waves at him. He unlocks the doors and she climbs in the front seat. “Hi!” she says with a polished smile that Alec recognizes because he’s seen it often on his face, and on Izzy’s and Jace’s. The practiced, careful smile perfected by the children of career politicians.  

She’s pretty, long blonde hair tied back in a complicated looking braid. He feels bad; she shouldn’t be out wasting her time with him, she should be dating actual guys who were actually interested in her. Maybe he could do this. It was a good sign he had thought she was pretty, right? How hard could it be?

Alec extends his hand to shake; “Alec Lightwood,” he says.

Still smiling, she shakes his hand. “Lydia Branwell. We met, actually, when we were kids. I went to a few of Izzy’s birthday parties.”

“Oh, yeah.”

She laughs. “It’s okay if you don’t remember. I won’t hold it against you.”

“I appreciate it. Bad memory.”

He actually has a phenomenal memory, but it seems like the right thing to say.

Lydia, evidently, is a professional at one-sided conversations, because she carries the weight through the car ride and well into dinner.

“You don’t think we’d get served here, do you?” Alec asks after they’ve ordered.

“Like, alcohol?” Lydia asks. “No way. My dad is friends with the owner. Plus isn’t this supposed to be your PR rebranding? No sure who your publicist is, but I’m pretty sure they would agree that underage drinking really isn’t the look you’re going for.”

“You - you know about that?”

“I mean. Yeah. C’mon. My dad told me that Alec Lightwood had asked for my number and was interested in going out with me, just completely out of the blue? It wasn’t that hard to put two and two together.” She shifts, guilty. “I also really love Little Things.”

“Oh,” Alec says. “So...”

“I know you’re gay. I don’t care.”

Alec stares at her. He’s relieved by her candor, but also. He’s pretty sure this is the first time he’s ever heard someone say he was gay out loud. He’s certainly never said it. It rolls off her tongue so easily, like she’s commenting on the weather. He feels a flash of hot anger at her flippancy, or maybe it’s jealousy. He doesn’t know. He doesn’t like it.

“I’m not, like, really gay. I think I could, you know, date women. If you wanted. I mean, it doesn’t have to be you, I’m just saying, I’m not like -” Alec stutters.

“Seriously, it’s none of my business. We can just be friends. It’s easier that way anyway, I’m super busy. Just, like, kiss me in front of people sometimes, okay? It’ll be fine.” She tears a piece of bread from the basket on the table and throws it in her mouth, seeming totally unconcerned with this whole thing.  

“Wow. Uh. Thank you.” He’s not sure what else to say.

She shrugs, chewing her bread.  “So. What’s Magnus Bane like?”

“Um. Nice.” Alec says.

“Is it true that he was secretly dating Tommy Mason? When they were in the band together?!”

“I never asked.”

Lydia looks scandalized at this colossal oversight. “Wow. Well. If you see him again. Just like. Maybe see if you can ask? Because I’d _really_ love to get confirmation.”

“I don’t think he has any interest in seeing me again” Alec says, drumming his fingers on his leg under the table.

Lydia finally clocks whatever expression he has right now, which he can only assume is somewhat dead-eyed, and backs off.

“Sorry,” Lydia says. “I’m sure you don’t want to talk about all that.”

“Not really,” Alec says, forcing a smile.

“I can talk less. Well. I think I can. In theory. I’ll work on it.”

Under different circumstances, he thinks he could like Lydia. She’s sweet, earnest. He can do this.  “No, you’re great. Thank you again for doing this.”

Lydia shrugs. “It’s a solid partnership. It helps our dads, and I’m trying to raise my profile before this big clean water fundraiser I’m doing in the fall. Also we’re both like, really pretty. We’re going to look great in photos together.”

Alec laughs. “I guess so.”

“Lydia, my beautiful girl. How are you?”

Alec follows the voice up to see a man in an expensive looking blazer, with his hand on Lydia’s shoulder. She jumps up and hugs him. “Hi Martin! This is my boyfriend, Alec Lightwood.”

Jesus. Well. She’s not wasting any time, is she. He supposes there’s no reason to. He suddenly hears the question Izzy asked him last week, before the photo leaked - _When do I get to meet your boyfriend?_. It echoes in his head. He stands mechanically and shakes hands with Martin.

“Pleasure.” Alec says.

“Martin owns the place,” Lydia says.

“Guilty!” Martin smiles. “Everything good so far?”

“It’s perfect, as always, thank you,” Lydia says with her Miss America smile.

“I’ll send a bottle of wine over for you kids,” Martin whispers conspiratorially. “On the house.”

Alec perks up, but Lydia shakes her head. “Martin, you know I’m only eighteen!” she says, like it’s the scandal of the century. God. Does this girl not drink?

Martin holds up his hands in supplication, “Of course, Miss Branwell, forgive me. I’ll leave you to your meal.”

When their food comes, he doesn’t really taste any of it. He assumes it’s good because Lydia tells him it is several times. He just wants to go home, and has to stop himself from openly sulking when Martin sends over a sampler of desserts for them. Finally, it’s time to leave, and he stands to pull back Lydia’s chair for her. She grins up at him.

Martin rushes back over. “Please, let me get a photo of you two. For the restaurant’s Instagram.”

“ _Perfect_ ,” Lydia says with a meaningful look at Alec. She drops back into her chair and gestures to Alec to kneel next to her, then drapes her arm around his shoulder and kisses him on the cheek. Martin loves it. He finally releases them and Alec stands quickly.

“Let’s go,” he says. His ability to be in this restaurant is waning by the moment. Lydia looks a bit surprised, but immediately adjusts her face back to an accommodating smile. In the car, they plan for Lydia to attend the Senator’s fundraiser as Alec’s date, and Lydia suggests a few more strategic appearances. Alec agrees to everything numbly.

Alec makes it home right before whatever is spinning out inside of him breaks open. He stops only to liberate a bottle of Glenfiddich from his father’s office before he goes to his room and shuts the door, locking it behind him even though he’s pretty sure no one else is home. He sinks down to the floor, leaning his head back against the door.

He takes a swig of the whiskey, feeling it burn down this throat. It calms him, quiets whatever’s barking in his head. _You’re okay_ he tries to soothe himself.  _You’re okay_. He was okay. He was fine. This was his choice, and he was going to see it through. He takes another sip.

He supposes he could have anticipated this, but he truly didn’t realize how much it would shatter him to be apart from Jace like this. They had been physically separated before, of course - but the complete silence, the way Jace’s departure had felt so utterly final - was unprecedented. He just couldn’t accept it. He takes another long drink from the bottle. It was helping, calming him down. He felt unmoored without Jace here.

He knows he’s just torturing himself at this point, and maybe that’s the appeal of it. He takes out his phone and slowly opens Magnus’s Instagram account. His most recent post (with 1.2 million likes, of course) shows him, arms around two boys, laughing on a red carpet. They’re his former bandmates, Alec thinks. He’s pretty sure one of them is Tommy, the one Magnus supposedly dated. He stares at Magnus, resplendent in a velvet tux jacket, head thrown back in laughter, gripping one of the other boy’s shoulders tightly. Well. Magnus was clearly doing fine. Jace was fine. Why was it always Alec who _wasn’t_? Why was he the one always slightly off-kilter, starting on the wrong foot, stumbling to find his balance? He takes another long sip, starting to feel the alcohol blur the edges of his brain. Maybe all that wasn’t for him.

And Jace. Well. God. He knew he loved Jace, the two had always been closer than friends, more than brothers. But this...this was something else. It was terrifying to realize how desperately he depended on him. How profoundly incapable Alec was of existing in a world drained of Jace. What really stung, though, was knowing that it had not affected Jace in the slightest. He was sure Jace missed him, of course. But he knew Jace was not undone the way he was, knew that Jace had chosen this, had been able to leave him without looking back. It didn’t surprise him that Jace needed him less than he needed Jace - he had known that. Alec had always relied on Jace, but Jace was a slightly feral creature, used to fending for himself in the wild, always sleeping with one eye open. He had been ready to bolt and leave Alec behind, he saw that now. But God, it hurt.

***

The campaign fundraiser is at their house, and despite the fact that the estate is always immaculate, Mother spends the days leading up to it on a truly record setting cleaning spree. Well. She doesn’t do any of the actual cleaning herself, obviously. But there’s a lot of hired help to direct and florists to yell at and caterers to book. With Izzy in New York and Jace in Nashville, the burden of soothing her mania falls to Alec. He doesn’t really mind though, not the way he usually would. He’s happy for the distraction, happy to have anything to think about that isn’t Jace. Or Magnus. Or the bitter taste of self-loathing that’s lingered in his mouth since Jace left two weeks ago. He wonders what it says about him that he marks the two weeks by Jace’s departure, not by having been outed to Father or breaking up with Magnus. _Nothing good_ , he thinks. _Nothing good_.

Alec is circling the airport, waiting for Izzy’s flight to get in. He had volunteered to go get her despite Mother’s protests ( _Just order car service_ _Alec, what do you think drivers are for_?) because he desperately needed to get out of the house before the fundraiser that evening. But for once Alec is more anxious than excited about seeing his sister. He’s missed her of course, he always misses her, but he’s been grateful to focus solely on his internship for the past two weeks, working long hours and bringing files home with him. He feels like he’s walking a tightrope; if he turns his head in either direction, looks too long or too hard at his life, he’ll go right over the edge. And Izzy has an uncanny ability to make him do exactly that.

There’s also the matter of Lydia. Alec hasn’t told Izzy he’s seeing her, or whatever it is he’s doing. He’s not particularly looking forward to hearing her assessment.

He finally spots her and pulls over. Izzy hops in the front seat and leans over to give him an awkward, one-armed hug. Awkward on his end. Nothing Izzy does is awkward.

“How are you?” she asks as he pulls back into traffic.

“Good. You?” Alec answers.

“Fine.”

“How was your flight?”

“Short. Thank God, cause I’m flying back tonight. I have a shitload of work to do.”

“It was nice you came,” Alec says.

Izzy stares at him for a long moment. Alec looks back at the road and they drive in silence for a bit. He can feel Izzy’s eyes on him, and it’s making him more nervous by the minute.

When he can’t take it anymore, he finally turns to look at her. She’s still staring at him, her face blank.

“What?” Alec demands.

“Are you going to tell me what in the name of all fuck you think you’re doing?” she says politely.

“I’m driving.”

Izzy looks like she wants to strangle him. “You fucking prick. I’m talking about Lydia.”

Alec swallows. “You heard about that?”

“Um, the greater DC Metro area and most of the Eastern Seaboard heard you two were dating. The girl all but took out an ad in the New York Times.” 

“It’s not that bad.”

“Oh, a real fucking ringing endorsement of your supposed relationship, Alec.” Then she sighs. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Alec gestures at her. “Did you think I was looking forward to this conversation?”

“I’m sorry, I mean. When I left you were - I just don’t understand, Alec.”

“I’m not asking you to understand.”

“Can you try to explain? Please?” Izzy puts her hand on his arm. “Alec, c’mon. It’s me.”

Alec sighs. “It’s not forever. And she’s really perfectly nice. It’s a good partnership for both of us.”

“But why? Even if you don’t want to be with Magnus after all that, why do this -”

“I’m doing it for myself. For my career.”

“Jesus, it’s 2017, you can be a fucking gay politician.”

“No. I can’t. Not with our last name”

Izzy swallows, and Alec knows that there’s nothing else to say because she knows he’s right.

“I just want you to be happy,” she says finally.

 _I think happiness just isn’t for some people_ , he thinks. “I am happy. Promise,” he says.

***

Alec can feel the weight of the flask in his jacket pocket as he stands chatting with an endless parade of politicians and donors, his arm around Lydia. She’s a pro, and she steers him around the room, stopping to chat with everyone who’s worth chatting with, remembering names and faces and innocuous topics of conversation without breaking a sweat. Tuxedoed waiters swoop around with plates of hors d'oeuvres, their movements choreographed to the swells of the string quartet. He’s been slipping sips from the flask every time Lydia takes her eye off him, but it’s not enough to assuage the mounting feeling of claustrophobia. He’s too hot in his suit, the humidity of the June night seeping into the ballroom. The room is oppressively full. At least everybody here has the manners to pretend they didn’t see the paparazzi pics. But they all know. He’s sure they all know.

Senator Gilbert breaks away from them to find his wife, and Lydia leans over to Alec to whisper in his ear.

“You need to eat something,” she breathes.

“I’m fine.”

Lydia raises an eyebrow at him.

“I said I’m fine.”

“Okay. Let’s go say hello to Judge Deakins. She wrote the amicus curiae for your father’s suit on that deregulation legislation.”

“I remember,” Alec grumbles.

Lydia pilots him over to Judge Deakins, a severe looking older woman with a bun so tight it looks like it’s keeping her skin in place.

“Judge Deakins!” Lydia says, as if it were a complete surprise to encounter her here.

“Oh hello, dear,” she says, kissing Lydia on both cheeks and shaking hands with Alec.

“Are you enjoying yourself?” Lydia asks, unable to stop herself from playing hostess even at someone else’s party.

“Of course, of course. The canapes are lovely. What’s in them?”

“Dunno,” Alec says.

“Prosciutto and melon, and just a hint of bleu cheese,” Lydia responds brightly. “It’s nice to run into you, Alec and I were just discussing the Burke ruling last week. What did you think of it?”

Deakins is ignoring her, looking around. “Is your brother here, Alec?”

“No,” he says curtly.

“Too bad. I always liked him.”

“Jace is traveling right now,” Lydia says smoothly.

“Actually, he moved back in with his biological father.”

Lydia gives him a warning look. Deakins finally seems to be paying attention.

“Oh dear, I wasn’t aware Jace’s father was still alive. I always thought that was why your parents so kindly took him in -”

“You know, funny story,” Alec says, “we actually didn’t know either. See, my parents have been lying to us -”

“Judge Deakins!” Izzy’s clear voice cuts him off, and he feels her hand on the small of his back. “I’m so terribly sorry to interrupt, but do you mind if I borrow my brother for a minute? We need his height in the kitchen.”

“Yes of course. He is very tall,” she says. Alec wonders if the old girl is slipping a bit. He lets Izzy lead him away, thinking that between her and Lydia, he’s been spending a lot of time lately being dragged around.

Izzy pulls him upstairs, not down towards the kitchen. When they’re safely in his room, she locks the door behind them and turns to him. “I thought you could use a breather.”

“Thanks,” Alec says. He takes the flask from his pocket and drains the rest of it.

“Share!” Izzy commands, extending a hand.

“Empty, sorry,” he says, turning it upside down to prove it.

“What’re you even drinking?” she asks.

“Whiskey.” He goes to the closet, where the bottle is stashed, and refills his flask. Izzy watches.

“Maybe slow down? We’ve got two more hours of this thing,” she says carefully.

“I know. Why do you think I’m drinking?”

He offers the bottle, but she shakes her head. He shrugs and paces to the bay window, looking out on the grounds, remembering the night Jace came crashing through it and they’d had to stitch him up.

“I hate campaign season,” Izzy sighs, following him to the window.

“And it’s just getting started!” Alec says with mock enthusiasm. He leans his head against the wall, knowing Izzy is looking at him in that aggravating way she does when she thinks she knows better than you.

“I know you’re having a hard time- ”

“Izzy, don’t start. Not right now.”

“I’m just saying I know how you feel!”

Alec snorts. “Please, enlighten me. How do I feel?”

“You miss Jace! I miss him too, it’s fucking weird as fuck that he’s just gone!”

“Well he is. And I don’t blame him.”

Izzy makes a face. “Well I do. He doesn’t have to cut _us_ out too, we didn’t do anything wrong.”

 _Yes,_ Alec thinks, _yes, I did_. He shrugs. “It’s all the same to him. We’re all guilty.”

She takes a careful breath, letting the quiet stand between them for a moment. “Have you told him? About any of what - what’s been going on?”

“No.”

“Maybe you should. I think he would want to know.”

“I’m not going to bother him. He made it clear he wants to be left alone.”

“He would want to know about this,” she says, crossing her arms stubbornly.

“You don’t know Jace like I do,” Alec says. “You don’t know how much his dad means to him. It’s like - it’s like they _stole_ Michael from him. And I don’t think he can forgive any of us for being part of it.”

“Well, that’s stupid.” She says, somehow managing to cross her arms even tighter.

“Our parents aren’t who we thought they were. It’s that simple.”

“Honestly Alec, of course it’s bad that they lied, but I think it’s more complicated -”

“It’s not just that they lied! It’s -” Alec stutters, trying to find words. “They spend all their time lecturing us on honor and honesty and the family name. They’re hypocrites. That’s what they are. Goddamn hypocrites, and -”

“And now they’re asking you to live a lie,” Izzy cuts in.

“That’s not what this is about. And they’re not asking me -”

“I know, I know. It was your decision.”

“Yes. So respect it, please, for once in your life.”

She stares at him for a long moment. “Want to know what I think?”

“No,” Alec says flatly.

She ignores him. “I think you’re trying to punish yourself. I think you’re dating her, putting yourself through this, as a punishment,” Alec tries to interrupt, but Izzy keeps talking over him. “As _penance_. For being gay. For loving men. For loving Ja-”

“Stop!” Alec yells, and she falls silent. “Just stop it, Isabelle.”

“It’s true, isn’t it?” She asks softly, reaching out to rest her hand on his arm. “You love him. You’re in love with him.”

The whole world tilts.  

“Don’t you dare.” Alec says, wrenching his arm away from her grasp. His voice is cold, stilted, but he can feel his skin burning.

“Oh, Alec,” Izzy says, so softly it sounds like a prayer.

“Do not.” Alec says. “I don’t need your pity.”

“No. Not pity. I just. I think - ”

“Get out of my room. Now. Please,” Alec says, his voice breaking.

She squeezes his arm lightly and takes a step back, releasing him. “I’m so sorry, Alec. I truly am.”

“Get out.”

Izzy leaves, shutting the door behind her, but Alec can’t be in this room anymore. He takes three long sips straight from the bottle, and then walks downstairs. Like a sleepwalker who doesn’t want to be woken, he moves through the party in a daze, out the front doors and onto the circular driveway packed with town cars. He walks into the fading light of the summer day with no destination, only the pulsating need to be as far as possible from everything he’s ever known.

 

**Jace, 20**

In a move Jace genuinely did not see coming, Lyle seems to like him significantly better after he’s broken his nose. Lyle treats him with a sort of fraternal camaraderie, and Jace feels an odd pull towards him. He’s both intrigued and slightly repulsed by him, and he can’t totally put his finger on why. He’s handsome and charming, sure, but there’s a roughness around him that Jace finds somewhat unsavory. He chalks it up to too many years spent with the Lightwoods, who would surely think this entire situation was “unsavory”.

It helps that they’ve spent hours together over the past two weeks, driving all over Nashville in Lyle’s truck to do various collections and drop-offs for Michael. Jace mostly stays in the car, but gradually Lyle starts to tell him more about the business, about where the money goes and where the drugs come from. Michael’s house is palatial, and based on the diversity and sheer number of people he has working under him, it’s clear he’s doing very well. It’s odd to see his father so successful, so established (albeit in a criminal enterprise, but hey). Jace remembers a childhood of wanting. Of needing and coming up short. He knows that when his mother was still alive they must have had some money, but Maryse had once told him that his grandparents disowned Celine when she married Michael. It had bothered Jace quite a bit at the time.

He and Lyle are in the basement, double checking the day’s takes. Well. Lyle is double checking the takes. Despite their newfound friendship, if you could even call it that, Lyle’s still deeply protective of the cash flow and insists that he alone handle it. Bored, Jace stretches and yawns. He’s been sleeping less than usual, which is saying something for him, and it’s starting to catch up with him. His head is throbbing. He knows he can pull off another month or so of two-hours-a-night sleep before he goes full _Machinist_ , so he’s not too worried about it. But he does wish Lyle would stop blasting Lynyrd Skynyrd quite so loudly.

“How’s it lookin’, boys?” Michael ambles down the stairs.

Lyle looks up from the counting machine. “Just finished. All square.” He nods to Jace, which Jace knows is his cue to start dividing up the cash to be laundered back through the bar and the youth center.

He thinks he’s finally getting used to the reality of his father, alive and breathing and in front of him, after all this time. At least the electric shock feeling he’d experienced each time Michael walked into a room for the first few days has finally worn off. It was quite strange to witness a resurrection, to suddenly have to contend with the humanness of a man he had immortalized in dreams and half-memories.

“Good work. Very good work.” Michael sits down at the table and turns down the music. “Got a little treat for you both. You’ve been working hard and I want you to know I see that and I appreciate it. I treat my people well, don’t I?

“Yes, sir,” Lyle nods.

Michael reaches into his pocket and produces a small, clear bag of tan powder. “Buddy of mine just got back from his second tour in Afghanistan. Brought us a little taster of that pure shit they got over there.”

“Fuck me,” Lyle says greedily.

“Get a razor,” Michael instructs. Lyle jumps to do as he’s told. “We’ll just snort a little, Jace. It’s really only shooting up that’ll get you in trouble with heroin,” he explains. “Just a little treat.”

That is, frankly, the stupidest thing Jace has ever heard, but he doesn’t particularly care. He knows exactly what he’s going to do, has known where this was headed since he showed up. Michael is watching him carefully. Everything with Michael was a test and fuck if Jace didn’t want to pass. He shrugs. “Sounds good.”

Lyle produces a mirror and a single razor blade, and Michael is tipping the contents of the bag out when Jace’s phone rings. He’d been using the calculator to double check Lyle’s math and left it out on the table. It lights up with Izzy’s name. As always, any reminder of Izzy or Alec feels like a punch to the gut. This is a completely different world, where Lightwoods would fear to tread, and the more comfortable he gets here the more he has to contend with the truth of what he’s always known - he was not, and would never be, one of them. He didn’t belong at Harvard, didn’t have any business being there in the first place, standing beside Alec. He doesn’t need reminders of what he’s lost, of what was never really his to have. His life with them had been a temporary fluke and the universe, as it always did, righted itself eventually and sent him back where he belonged.

He silences his phone. Michael looks like he’s going to say something, but then the phone rings again. Izzy Lightwood.

“Looks like your girl’s trying to find you,” Lyle says.

“It’s just my sister,” Jace says, silencing his phone again quickly.

“No,” Michael says plainly. “Clarissa is your sister. Not the Lightwood girl.”

“I know,” says Jace. “I just call her that sometimes, it’s easier.” He doesn’t like the look in Michael’s eyes.

Michael has cut the heroin into three lines. He lowers his head and snorts one in a long controlled breath. He exhales, rubbing his nose languidly. Lyle hovers behind him, waiting for the invitation, but Michael passes the mirror to Jace.

“Know what to do, kid? Or is this your first time playing with the big boys?” Lyle asks.

“Fuck off,” Jace says, although of course it’s his first time. The Lightwoods’ parenting approach actually hadn’t involved providing their children with heroin, and while he’d taken molly and LSD from time to time in college, he knew heroin was a different ball game.

“Jace,” Michael says without inflection.

He lowers his head quickly to the mirror and snorts.

Jace got hit in the face pretty fucking regularly. He’d had his nose broken in three places, lost two teeth, torn an earlobe, and still had a rather spectacular scar along his scalp from the time Izzy’d stitched him up. So he felt qualified to say that the heroin landed like a punch, splitting his face open in a line of fire. He blinks, eyes watering. “Motherfucker.”

Michael laughs. Jace’s nose and throat are burning, it feels like he’s poured antifreeze into his brain. He shakes his head a little. “Take it easy, boy,” Michael says. “You’re fine.”

“I know.” Jace says, wiping his nose. He can already feel the heroin entering his bloodstream and for a moment he’s sure he’s going to throw up. He wills himself not to, knowing exactly the glee Michael and Lyle would show if he did. Lyle loses his patience and comes up behind Jace, grabbing the mirror with the remaining line. He takes it like a communion.

Once the nausea passes, Jace actually feels pretty good. The glow settles over him almost immediately, rounding out the edges of things and softening his world. He leans back in his chair, feeling his muscles slacken. It’s like sinking into a hot bath. Michael is watching him.

“Good fucking shit,” Lyle says. “Who’s bartending tonight?”

“Audrey,” Michael answers, still looking at Jace.

“Excellent.” Lyle starts to head up the stairs.

“Hey,” Michael warns. “Behave.”

Lyle snickers, letting the door slam behind him.

Jace’s vision blurs a little on the edges. He tries to swim through it, to refocus on Michael.

“Tell me about the Lightwood girl.”

“Izzy?” Jace says. “She’s cool.” Referring to Izzy simply as ‘cool’ feels profoundly disloyal, but he doesn’t want to get into it. He knows Michael will pick apart whatever he says and some instinct that he can’t explain makes Jace want to shield Izzy from him.

“You can’t possibly think she sees you as her equal.”

“Her equal?” Jace parrots, confused.

“People like the Lightwoods, they don’t accept people like us. Not really.”

“They were always nice to me,” Jace says, his thoughts slightly muddled.

“You’re a charity case to them. You know that, right? Another little project. Didn’t you notice the pity in their eyes when they looked at you? Their confusion at your lack of breeding? You were like a pet to them. Something to keep around for enjoyment, but not a member of the family.”

“That’s not true,” Jace says.

“Then why did they never offer you their last name? They never wanted you to be one of them.”

Jace swallows but his throat is unbelievably dry. He doesn’t have an answer to that. Michael continues. “They brought a feral stray home and tried to see if they could turn it into show dog. It was an experiment to them. But you can’t change what you are, Jace. Blood calls to blood. That’s why you found me. That’s how I always knew you’d find me.”

Jace nods, his father’s words stoking the fire of self-doubt that had long burned deep inside him.

“They treated your mother just the same, after she met me. She and Maryse had been best friends their entire lives. And then she chose me over Maryse and Maryse never forgave her. I was scum to her. And then she took my boy from me.”

Jace has the distinct sense that Michael isn’t even talking to him anymore. “But you let them,” Jace says. His thoughts are streaming away from him like water from his hands; he can’t hold on to anything, can’t get a proper look at it.

“I was protecting myself. I taught you that Jace. Always protect yourself. Chew off your own paw ‘fore you let the trap kill you. You would do the same. You just did.”

“Okay,” Jace says, not knowing what he’s agreeing with.

“Promise me you’ll never speak to those Lightwood children again.”

“Michael -”

“Promise me! You’re always going to be worthless to them. Always. Do you understand me?”

Jace nods again. “Yes. I do. I promise.”

“Good boy,” says Michael. “Very good.”

And that’s all Jace can remember before the heroin fully carries him away.

***

Jace sleeps until noon the next day and when he wakes up in a sweat, his first thought is that he must have gotten hit by a truck. That’s the only possible explanation for how fucking terrible he feels. His mouth is cotton and he almost chokes on his tongue. Jesus.

He drags himself out of bed and into the shower, but he has to lean against the shower wall to support himself and eventually just ends up sliding down the cold porcelain.  He lets the boiling water drum against his skin. _You’re just coming down_ he tries to convince himself. _This isn’t going to kill you_. He isn’t sure how long it’s been when he finally shuts off the water and gets out. He looks at himself in the bathroom mirror, wiping the steam away. He thinks he’s gotten leaner since coming down here; he hasn’t been lifting regularly and Michael isn’t exactly big on regular balanced meals. He looks off, somehow, like a carbon copy of himself. Jace runs his fingers over his arms, covered in tattoos, and turns sideways to examine the silly little stick and poke he and Alec had gotten all those summers ago. He touches it lightly. And then he really does throw up, heaving into the sink.

He finally makes it over to the bar and heads down to the basement to find Lyle. Lyle takes one look at him and laughs. “Here,” he says, throwing him an unmarked bottle.

“No, thanks man. I’m done.” Jace throws them back.

“It’s just Desoxyn. It’ll level ya out, from coming down.” Lyle throws the bottle to him again.

Whatever. Jace pops the cap.

“Take three,” Michael says, yelling out his open office door. “I need you sharp. You’ve got rounds to do tonight.”

Jace does as he’s told.

Lyle looks at Jace smugly. “Fucked Audrey last night.”

“Which one’s Audrey?” Jace says, sinking into a chair and rubbing his forehead.

“The bartender! Hot as shit? Brunette? Great ass?”

“Oh, sure,” Jace says.

“What’s wrong with you, man? She’s the only good looking bitch in this place.”

“Yeah.” Jace says.  

Lyle shakes his head at him and takes two handguns from under the table. He slides one across the table to Jace, who grabs it and checks the safety before pocketing it. He’s comfortable with guns; Michael had taught him how to shoot a Colt .45 as a kid, and he’d hunted with Robert and Alec a few times on various family vacations. He’d never pointed a gun at a person though, let alone fired it, and he had no intention of starting now. He’d been carrying the 9mm on rounds with Lyle for the past few weeks, just because it was easier to take it when offered than to have the conversation about why he wouldn’t use it.

“When was the last time you went to the shooting range?” Lyle asks.

“Uh, never.”

“Fuck, man, I can’t have my number two be a sloppy shot. C’mon.”

Lyle drags him out back to shoot tin cans until the sun starts to fade from the sky. Jace isn’t a bad shot, and Lyle seems satisfied. It’s actually kind of fun, and they dick around outside until Michael comes to find them.

“It’s dark, y’all can get to work,” he announces. “Stop wasting bullets.”

“Teaching your boy how to stay alive,” Lyle says, heading back inside.

“Good,” Michael says. “Playing house with those Lightwood brats made you weak.”

Jace follows Lyle inside, contending with the prickling realization that he isn’t particularly sure he likes Michael. He loves his father, of course, he’s just not sure he likes him.

 

**Jace, 14**

Even though he’s currently spending his third consecutive summer at Camp Winnetka, Jace still finds himself slightly baffled by the entire concept of summer camp. It’s an extraordinary amount of time and energy and money for everyone involved to basically allow a group of boys to do the same shit Jace would do if he was in his backyard in Kentucky. He secretly thinks they get shipped off to summer camp so Maryse doesn’t have to put up with having them in the house all day. But still. He’s not complaining. He loves being outside, getting to run and hike and box and row in the sun. And he gets to be with Alec and sometimes they sneak over to Wildwood, the girl’s camp across the lake, to visit Izzy. He chalks summer camp up as another one of those things rich kids took for granted as a universal experience. Alec and Izzy were horrified that he had never been. But they were also horrified that he’d never traveled abroad before, that he’d never been in a helicopter, that he didn’t know cheese had to be plated on marble. Jace had taken to yelling “RICH KID SHIT” at them whenever they launched into a “what do you _mean_ you don’t know how to tie a tie!?” or whatever the scandal of the day was.

Alec, in the bunk below him, pushes his foot up into Jace’s mattress, jostling him.

“What?” Jace asks, pretending to be annoyed.

“You asleep?” Alec whispers.

“Obviously not.”

“Just got a text from Bunk 5. They’re sneaking over to Wildwood to see the girls. Wanna go?”

“Duh,” Jace says. He jumps off his bunk, landing silently in a crouch next to Alec.

“How do you do that?” Alec mutters at him as he sits up in bed.

“Ninja skills, yo,” Jace says, pulling a face to make Alec laugh.

“Oh my god, you’re so embarrassing. Never mind. I can’t be seen with you.” Alec pretends to climb back into his bed.

“C’mon, before David wakes up!” Jace says poking his brother in the ribs.

Alec grunts and Jace shushes him and they both end up giggling and then shushing each other again. They slip out the cabin and find a group of five or so other boys waiting for them outside, crouched down behind the bushes.

“Alec almost got us caught,” Jace announces.

“I did not!” Alec yelps.

“Shhh,” Ritchie says. “Let’s go.”

Jace and Alec follow the Bunk 5 boys to the woods, where the short cut to Wildwood lies. It’s pitch black out here, far from the lights of the nearest city, and their flashlight beams dance across the trees. Once they’re away from the cabins, their whispers turn to boisterous shouts.

They’re almost there when there’s a loud thump from behind him and Alec shrieks. Jace whips around to find him. “Alec? Alec?”

Someone shines a flashlight at them and Jace sees Fred Hammer, that piece of shit from Bunk 4, on top of Alec, laughing uproariously. “Dude, you were so scared,” Fred laughs.

Alec shoves him off. “Don’t do shit like that,” he mutters. He turns to Jace, almost defensive - “He jumped out of the tree!”

Jace extends a hand to Alec, pulling him back to his feet.

“Aw, need your big brother to protect you?” Fred says in a baby voice.

“I’m younger than him,” Jace says, annoyed.

“I thought you guys were twins,” says Ritchie.

“No, they’re not even related,” pipes up the kid with the rat face who always follows Ritchie around. Jace can never remember his name.

“Jace is adopted,” Alec explains. Jace rolls his eyes. He doesn’t think they owe any of these guys a breakdown of their family tree.

“I didn’t know that,” Ritchie says.

“Have you ever looked at us?” Jace asks, irritated.  

“Don’t piss off the Hulk,” Fred sneers.

Jace’s hand clenches into a fist. “Buddy, you wanna meet the Hulk, just keep talking.”

Fred laughs, but Jace sees him shrink back a bit behind Ritchie. That’s what he thought.

Alec stays close behind Jace until they arrive at the boathouse, where several of the more adventurous girls from Wildwood are sitting in a loose circle, passing around a bottle of wine.

“Izzy didn’t come?” Alec asks.

“Nah,” says one of the girls, Billie. “She’s stuck on dish duty tonight.”

“Bummer,” Jace says.

But he’s happy to see Annie Sellers among them - she’s by far the prettiest girl in the under 16s, and Jace has had his eye on her since he heard the rumor she gave Mitch Owens a blow job behind the mess hall last year. He makes sure to sit by her.

“Where’d you get that?” demands the rat-faced kid.

“Annie’s dad took us into town last weekend,” Darby says smugly, flipping her hair over her shoulder. Darby’s name was actually Izzy Darby, but as their Izzy was the preeminent Izzy at Wildwood, Darby had been demoted to her last name.

“Pass it around,” Ritchie demands, sitting down in the circle.

Annie drains what’s left of the bottle in one long swig. “Sorry, boys. It’s empty. Guess we’ll have to do something else with it.”

“Spin the bottle!” shrieks a red-haired girl Jace doesn’t know but instantly likes.

 _Excellent_ , he thinks, making sure to catch Annie’s eye.

Alec sits down by the redhead. He looks grumpy considering the circumstances. They needed to get Alec some action. Jace would make sure Alec got a turn.

“What are the rules?” Rat Boy asks, taking command of the bottle.

“There are no rules in spin the bottle,” says Billie.

“Peter’s just nervous he’s going to have to touch a girl for the first time,” says Fred.

Peter. That was the rat faced kid’s name. Whatever. He liked Rat Boy better.

“I’ll go first,” Ray Boy sneers, spinning the bottle. It lands on the redhead, and everyone cheers and taunts them as he leans across the circle and tentatively pecks her on the lips.

“Knew it,” says Fred, rolling his eyes. “Your turn, Alec.”

Alec spins. Maybe Alec could kiss Annie. Seems like she’d give him a good crash course. The bottle slows, petering to a halt with almost comical indecisiveness. For a moment Jace is optimistic it’s landed on Annie; but then it slides just one more centimeter over. Pointing directly at Jace.

“I’ll go again,” Alec says quickly.

“No, no,” Fred says. “The rules of spin the bottle are very clear.”

“I thought there were no rules,” Annie says. “Let him spin again.”

“What, are you guys homophobic?” Rat Boy asks.

Jace rolls his eyes. “Seriously?”

“You did say you’re not really brothers,” points out Ritchie.

“Haven’t you only known each other for a few years?” says one of the other boys.

“That’s true,” says Darby. “You’re basically just friends. So if you’re not homophobic…”

Jace can see color rising in Alec’s cheeks. God. They’re going to pick at this, gnaw on it like a dog with a sore in summer until they get the rise out of Alec they want.

“I get it. Alec’s never kissed anyone before,” Fred says. “It’s okay, you can go back to your bunk. Let the grown ups play.”

“Yes I have,” Alec says stubbornly.

Jace sighs. He knows how boys like Fred control a room. He’ll work the other kids up into a fever pitch, and the more Alec lets on that this is bothering him, the harder he’ll push. The more Alec protests, the more they’ll think he’s lying. Alec is looking at him with a desperate sort of pleading in his eyes, clearly begging for an escape route. So Jace takes the easiest one he can think of. He rises to his knees, leans across the circle and grabs the back of Alec’s neck. And then he kisses him. He makes it a good one, partially to shut everyone up, but also because once he’s there he finds he doesn’t particularly mind kissing Alec. He’d always loved the way Alec smelled, the sweet, clean laundry scent of him, and it turned out he tasted that way too.

He leans back, releasing Alec. Everyone in the room is shocked silent. And then Ritchie starts a slow clap. “Honestly didn’t think you’d do it. Mad props, bro.”

With that the others break into giggles and cheers. Billie grabs the bottle. “My turn!”

They start picking on Billie, moving on from Alec the way Jace knew they would. He tries to catch Alec’s eye, so he can smile, roll his eyes and remind him that they were united against these asshole kids. But Alec is staring determinedly at Billie like he’s going to be tested on her face later. _Well that’s the thanks I get_ , he thinks. Whatever. He would make sure Alec got to kiss one of the girls before the night was out. Honestly, he was America’s greatest wingman.

***

Alec yawns through breakfast the next morning, as do most of the Bunk 5 campers. Jace feels great though, wolfing down hash browns. He’s supposed to go on a hike today led by Andrew, one of his favorite counselors, and he’s been looking forward to it all week. And then it would be the weekend; which was usually when they got to see Izzy.

Jace helps himself to Alec’s toast, which he seems to have abandoned, and is chewing enthusiastically when Ritchie drops into the seat next to him. “Just heard the hike’s canceled. Andrew’s got poison ivy again.”

“How does that keep happening to him?” demands Alec.

“Keeps sneaking off in the woods with Blair,” says Ritchie. The boys laugh.

“Good for him,” Jace says.

Ritchie laughs. “True. We’ll do it next week.”

Jace, suddenly finding himself with a free day, nudges Alec. “What do you have this morning, Al?”

“Archery.”

“Can I come?” Jace asks. “I’ve never tried it.”

Alec shrugs. He’s in a mood about something, but Jace ignores it. Alec was always in a mood about something, and he generally announced it if he wanted Jace to do something about it.

Once they’re on the archery range, Alec livens up. He loves shooting, it’s always been his favorite part of camp. And he’s damn good at it. He shows Jace how to stand, how to position the arrows and pull the string tight.

“It’s hard,” Alec says. “It’s all about precision. You gotta keep practicing until you can do it with your eyes closed. But also, like, don’t do it with your eyes closed. Please.”

Jace laughs. Alec fires off a shot, which lands dead center in the bull’s eye. Jace whoops, and Alec flashes a proud smile at him. “You try,” he instructs Jace.

Jace sets up, trying to keep all of Alec’s instructions in mind. Alec pulls his shoulder down. “Right angles!” he says in a mock drill sergeant voice. Jace corrects himself and lets the arrow fly. It lands just a millimeter above Alec’s, right in the inner ring.

“Yooooooo!’ Jace cries in victory. He turns to Alec, expecting a high five, and is surprised to see Alec looking at him blankly, arms crossed.

“What?”

“Nothing,” Alec says stonily. He moves down to the next target. “Gonna shoot some more.”

“Kay.” Jace shrugs and picks up another arrow. He was having too much fun to waste time deciphering Alec’s mood.      

Allie, the counselor on duty, wanders over to Jace. “Hey, if you’re new if you need to do a basics lesson with me first, for safety.”

“I’m good,” Jace says confidently. He shoots another arrow, which lands slightly below the inner ring. Allie raises her eyebrows.

“Oh, I didn’t realize you’d done archery before.”

“Not till this morning, but Alec showed me.”

“Let’s see it again,” Allie says, sounding suspicious.

Jace has never turned down an opportunity to perform for a pretty girl. He shoots three arrows in a row, hitting the mark with all of them.

Ally claps. “Damn. You _have_ to start coming to archery. You’re a natural.”

Jace shrugs. “Sure.” He looks over his shoulder to catch Alec’s eye, but is surprised to see that Alec has stormed off and is heading back to their cabin. “One sec,” he says, dropping his bow and running to catch up with his brother.

“Alec!” he calls. “Hey!” Jace grabs his forearm, but Alec shrugs him off, not stopping. “Alec, what?”

Now he stops, wheeling around to look at Jace. “Seriously?” Alec demands.

“Seriously, what? What are you angry about?”

“Nothing.”

“It’s obviously not nothing.”

“If you don’t know I’m not gonna tell you.”

“Oh my god, Al, are you five?”

Alec sighs. “You just - you can’t let me have _one_ thing?”

“What are you talking about?”

“My house, my parents, my sister, my friends, my camp, and of course you’re better than me at archery...”

Jace feels like he’s been slapped. He had no idea Alec felt this way, and his stomach drops. “I’m not trying to steal your life,” he says petulantly. “I didn’t ask to be adopted.”

“I _know_ that,” Alec starts. “It’s just - “

“Just what? What do you want me to do? Move out?”

“No!”

“Want me to promise I’ll never do archery again?” Jace says mockingly.

Alec shoves him, hard. Jace doesn’t go anywhere - he’s far too solid for that - so he closes his eyes and exhales, fighting the instinct to hit Alec back. He’s being an idiot and he kind of deserves it, but Jace has been working on this.

“I didn’t know it bothered you so much,” Jace finally says. “Having me around.” He tries to keep his voice even but it’s tinged with hurt.

Alec looks up, his big eyes wide with regret. “ _No_. I don’t - It’s not. It’s not like that. I’m sorry, I just - ” Alec exhales, frustrated, and then he finally spits it out - “Why did you kiss me?”.

“Oh my God, is that what you’re upset about? Alec, who cares. It was stupid. I was just trying to get them to stop picking on you.”

“You don’t always have to defend me, I can fight back myself.”

“Really? Because you weren’t. And it worked, didn’t it? So it doesn’t matter.”

“Okay.” Jace stares at him. He’s genuinely surprised it had upset Alec so much. Jace had thought it was kind of fun, but now he regrets the whole thing. “Let’s just - just don’t tell anybody about it, okay?” Alec continues.

Jace nods - he’s a bit offended, he’s much more used to people bragging about kissing him - but it seems best that they just forget about this. “Duh,” Jace says.

Alec nods. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean what I said.”

“It’s okay. I’m sure it sucks to have a brother you never asked for.”

Alec shakes his head hard. “No. No. It’s the best. I mean it. You make everything better.”

Jace feels his stomach unclench, finally. “I can try to be less good at stuff sometimes, if that would help,” Jace says, trying and utterly failing to keep a straight face.

Alec shoves him again, but this time it’s playful. “You’re an asshole.”

“Yeah, but I’m _your_ asshole,” Jace clarifies. “Plus you know you’re way smarter than me, right? You’re gonna be President one day and I’m gonna be like, the guy who takes the President’s trash out.”

Alec makes a face, “Ohhhh, I’m so sorry, that position’s already been filled actually. Maybe you can take out the Vice-President’s trash?”

Jace rolls his eye while Alec laughs at his own joke. “Very generous of you. Can we please go back and do archery now? Because that shit is fun. Also Allie’s a babe.”

“Yeah. Yeah we can.”

“Race you back,” Jace says. He takes off, and just as he hoped, Alec’s feet pound the grass behind him as he tries to catch up. Jace runs fast, but not fast enough to get too far ahead of Alec, running purely for the satisfaction of knowing that Alec will always chase after him.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

**Alec, 20**

Alec is planning to stay late at the DA’s office so he can justify canceling on Lydia tonight, and he’s just settling in with a new batch of case files when Raj, one of the other interns, sticks his head into Alec’s cubicle. “The fuck are you doing?” he demands.

Alec gestures vaguely at the files. “What does it look like?”

“Can you please stop working for three minutes? You promised you’d come out with us tonight.” Alec has absolutely no memory of promising anything of the sort and shakes his head. Raj went to Stanford, but had attended high school with him and Jace. Alec tried to remember if he’d always been this annoying or if it was a new development. “I promise it’ll be fun.”

“I can’t, sorry.”

“C’mon, it’s Marco’s birthday. You’re not going to buy the guy a drink on his birthday?”

“Nope,” Alec says. But apparently Raj attended the Izzy Lightwood school of Not Taking No For An Answer, because within the hour Alec finds himself at a bar downtown, packed full of interns. He had texted Lydia to tell her what he’d been roped into. She’d been fine with it, although it seemed like she was angling for an invitation to join. He’d pretended not to pick up on it. He needed a fucking break.

They have a private room at the back, and everyone is drinking and chatting and networking away. He sits on one of the couches, not particularly interested in starting a conversation with any of these people, but finds he doesn’t mind when Maia Maaz, who works at the UN, drops into the seat next to him.

“Anyone sitting here?” she asks.

“Please,” Alec says, scooting over.

Maia smiles at him, adjusting her hijab. “How is it possibly this hot at 9PM?!” she moans.

“Just wait for August,” Alec says.

“Ugh.” She takes a sip of her Coke. “So how’s Lydia?”

“Oh,” Alec says, surprised but recovering quickly. “Very well, thank you. She’s sorry she couldn’t make it tonight. I didn’t realize you two knew each other.”

Maia nods. “We did Model UN together for ages, so we go back to the dark days of high school.” She pretends to shudder. “I love that you’re dating, you guys are so cute together.”

“Thank you,” Alec says stiffly.

“By the way, heard your father is forming an exploratory committee for his presidential campaign. Congratulations.”

“Thanks. It’s all very early stages. He’s standing by for RNC orders, you know how it is. But he’s got a strong base among moderates so there’s definitely a big push in his favor.” Alec wishes he were literally anywhere else. It all feels so pointlessly self-congratulatory, this circle jerk of political networking and self-promotion. Everyone in this room was only interested in advancing their own position in the DC hierarchy. Even Maia, who was the only one of these people he actually liked. Even him, if he was being honest.

From the other end of their room, a couple of girls call to Maia, waving her over. She makes a face at Alec. “Sorry, be right back.” Alec smiles at her, happy to take the reprieve. He drains the rest of his gin and tonic and goes to order another. Jace was the one who had taught him to like gin and tonics, who had stressed the importance of having a solid signature cocktail so girls knew what to make for you. He shakes his head. Jace had a lot of ideas about that sort of thing that he was always trying to impart to Alec. But he supposed whatever Jace was doing was working for him. He wondered if he was seeing someone in Nashville. Some Southern girl who was impressed with his big city credentials or something. His parents still weren’t concerned about Jace’s absence, which was now in it’s fifth week. 33 days, to be exact. But who’s counting? _There’s no harm in him spending the summer down there_ , Maryse had said the other night over dinner. _He’ll come back for senior year and that’ll be that_. Honestly, Alec envied her confidence. In not speaking to them, to him, at all, Jace had done more than left. He had drawn a line and made it very clear that they stood on separate sides. They had always been on the same side before. He wonders if they ever will be again.

With a fresh drink in his hand, Alec makes his way back to their room and finds that Raj has taken Maia’s vacated seat. _Lord_. Steeling himself, Alec joins him. Raj leans forward, resting his forearms on his thighs like they’re in a huddle. “So,” he says.

“So, what?” Alec asks.

“Do you remember when we first met?” Raj asks conspiratorially. He sounds drunk, his words slurring a bit. But Alec is starting in on his fourth gin and tonic so he supposes he can’t throw stones. Alec shakes his head. He assumes it was sometime in high school, but why Raj remembers is beyond him. “It was at Macy Roman’s birthday party. Her sweet sixteen, at the Natural History Museum. Do you remember?”

“Um. Vaguely.”

“Want to know why I remember?” Raj asks, leaning still closer.

Alec is getting annoyed. He wants Raj to shut up, to get out of his space. He looks around for Maia, hoping she’ll come back and bail him out, but she’s telling an animated story to some girls in the corner and he can’t catch her eye. “Why?” he says defeatedly.

“Because I remember thinking you were the most beautiful guy I had ever seen,” Raj says. He puts his hand on Alec’s knee. Alec jerks his legs away. “Wait, what?!”

“C’mon. You must have figured out by now that I’m into you,” Raj says, trying again. Alec stands up quickly.

“Sorry,” he says. “I need to go”

Raj cocks his head, standing up too. “Alec. It’s okay. I know you’re gay.” He leans forward. “I saw the pictures. Well done with him, by the way.”

“I’m not gay.”

“Okay sure,” Raj says. “I’m not gay either. I just really like dicks.” He takes another step toward Alec and without thinking, Alec shoves him. Drunk and off balance to begin with, Raj stumbles and falls to the ground. The room falls silent around them.

“Dude, what the fuck?” Raj says, voice raised.

Maia comes back over. “What’s going on?” she says calmly, trying to diffuse the tension.

“Nothing,” Alec says, his breathing heavy. “I’m sorry. I need to go.”

Maia pulls Raj to his feet as Alec turns to leave. He lets the door slam, but not before he hears Raj calls after him - “Who the fuck do you think you’re kidding, Lightwood?!”.

Alec storms out into the street and just keeps walking. He finally loses steam a few blocks from the bar and slows to a stop. Fuck. He doesn’t want to have to face Raj tomorrow, doesn’t want to have to face any of them. There’s a liquor store across the street, and Alec crosses to enter. The cashier takes one look at him and raises his eyebrows, but if he recognizes Alec he chooses to ignore it and sells him a bottle of whiskey without carding him. Alec wonders if he’s also seen the pictures.

It’s dark out, past 10PM, but still the baking heat clings to the city. With no particular destination in mind Alec begins to wander, taking swigs from the brown paper bag-wrapped bottle. He knows this is bad, that he’s in bad shape, that this looks bad. All bad. It’s all bad. But he can’t be alone in his own head anymore. It’s become intolerable. He wants out of his body, out of his skin, out of his brain. He’s gone away from the city center and the roads are quieter now. He’s truly and properly drunk now and he knows it. He stumbles a bit and decides not to fight gravity, lowering himself instead to sit on the curb. He watches people walk past and tries to guess who’s seen the pictures of him and Magnus. That group of teenage girls definitely have. That older man in a suit, maybe not. The woman with her baby probably has. Fucking Magnus.

Alec pulls out his phone and calls Magnus. He doesn’t expect him to answer; he’s probably having tea with the Queen or being jetted off to one of his private islands or whatever. But he does, on the second ring. It’s loud wherever Magnus is, but his voice sounds clear. “Alec?”

“Magnus,” Alec slurs.

“Hi. Are you okay?” Magnus says something away from the receiver, and then the line gets quieter. He must have gone outside.

“No,” Alec says.

“What’s -”

“You ruined my life,” Alec interrupts him.

Magnus doesn’t say anything, so Alec just keeps talking. “Why’d you have to find me? In that club? I was fine. I was _fucking fine_.” Alec can hear how pathetic he sounds, hates himself for being so stupid.

“Truly, from the bottom of my heart, Alexander, I’m sorry. I’m sorry those photos were taken, I’m sorry they were posted, and I’m sorry you got hurt.”

Alec snorts. “No consequences for you though. You’re just fucking fine.”

“Well, I don’t know about fine. But you’re right. It’s not fair.” Alec pinches the bridge of his nose. “I miss you Alec. I really did have feelings for you.”

“Then why did you _do this to me_?!” Alec almost yells.

Magnus is quiet for a long moment, and Alec checks the phone to see if he’s hung up on him. But then Magnus says, “Are you talking about the pictures, still?”

“What the fuck else would I be talking about?”

“Maybe about how you feel. How you _felt_ , about being with me. Is that what you’re angry about?”

“Fuck you, Magnus. You don’t know me.”

“Maybe not. But I won’t apologize for being attracted to you. And you shouldn’t be angry about being attracted to me.”

“I’m not attracted to you,” Alec spits.

“Okay,” Magnus says. Alec breathes hard, feeling like he’s been running.

“You ruined my life,” Alec says again, softer this time, and he’s horrified to hear a half-sob in his throat.  

“No,” says Magnus. “No, I think you’ve decided to do that yourself.” And then Magnus really does hang up. Alec stares at the phone in his hand for a second. Fuck Magnus. What the fuck did he know. He didn’t know Alec at all. But Alec can’t seem to stop crying now that he’s started. He wipes the back of his hand across his face savagely, trying to clear the tears, and staggers to his feet again, taking another long sip from the bottle. He can’t tell how much he’s drunk. He keeps walking.

He’s lost, he realizes now, completely turned around in the suburbs. It’s fine. He has a phone. He can call a car. He keeps walking.

The houses in this neighborhood all look the same, and Alec’s eyes, glazed over by the whiskey, slide uselessly from house to house, not really absorbing anything. A group of boys are playing basketball in the driveway on the corner, the flickering lights of a garage behind them. One of them has an undercut, his blond hair slicked back. Alec stares, forcing his eyes to focus. It’s not Jace, of course it’s not. The kid’s sixteen at most. And Jace is gone. His defenses dulled from drinking, an image flashes into his mind unbidden. Jace, shirtless, as he’s seen him millions of times. Alec’s fingers brushing Jace’s chest. Jace’s body responding to his touch.

There had to be something wrong with him. That was the only explanation. It was some kind of sickness, to want someone you considered a sibling that way. He wants to be free from this. He tries to remember the various penances he’s been prescribed over the years at confessions. He keeps walking, in the middle of the road now, trying to tightrope walk on the median.

“ _Ave Maria_ ,” he starts, speaking to the empty night air. “ _Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus tecum_.” He can’t remember what comes next. “ _Ave Maria, gratia plena, Dominus...Dominus tecum_.”

He tries to keep lining his feet up, placing them squarely on the median line. If he keeps his feet on the median he’ll be okay. “Forgive me Father, for I have sinned,” he tries again. “Forgive me Father, for I have coveted. I have lusted.” He sways unevenly, suddenly sure he’s going to vomit. No. He just has to keep his feet on the median. “Forgive me Father,” he says again. _Please forgive me_ , he thinks _, please take this away_. _It’s too heavy for me. It’s too damn heavy._

Red and blue lights bathe Alec, and for a moment he’s disoriented, unable to find their origin. And then the cop car pulls up from behind, cutting him off.

“Hey son,” says the cop on the passenger side, leaning out the window. He’s got a slight Virginia drawl. “Why don’t you take a seat on the sidewalk here for a second so we can have a little chat.”

Alec does as he’s told.

“Been doing any drinking tonight?” he asks, getting out of the car, hand on his holster.

“Yes, sir,” Alec says.

“Can I see some ID?”

Alec hands over his wallet. The cop flips through it, then looks at his ID. He looks back at Alec. “Your daddy Robert Lightwood?”

“Yes, sir.”

The cop purses his lips, then leans back into the car to consult with his partner. He shows him Alec’s ID, and then the second cop makes a phone call.

“You just stay put, boy,” the first cop says. Alec shrugs. He has no intention of doing anything but staying put. Now that he’s sitting down, the prospect of walking again seems frankly unrealistic.

The other cop hangs up his phone, and starts talking to his partner in muted tones. Alec doesn’t try to listen. He doesn’t particularly care what they do with him.

The first cop comes back and kneels in front of Alec. “Okay, son. We’re going to take you home. Do we need to cuff you?”

Alec shakes his head, and allows himself to be half-dragged into the back of the car. His head lolls back as the cops flip on the lights and speed towards Bethesda. His body feels heavy, listless and stupid. He shuts his eyes.

Next thing he knows Mother is gripping him by the arm, thanking the cops profusely at the front door. “Mom,” Alec says, startled to see her. “Hi!” He knows the look on her face, the thin line of her mouth that conceals rage. Uh-oh.

She shuts the door, thanking them again in a cheery falsetto, and then rounds on Alec. “What in _God’s_ name do you think you’re doing Alexander Robert Lightwood?” Alec shrugs. He feels like the answer is pretty self-evident.

“The officers said you were so intoxicated they didn’t even bother to breathalyze you. What have you been drinking?”

“Whiskey,” Alec says promptly. “And some gin.”

“ _Why_?!” she demands.

He shrugs again.

“Alexander! I am so ashamed of you.”

“Join the club,” Alec says sarcastically.

“You know, I’d expect this kind of behavior from Jace - ” An electric current passes through him at the mention of Jace’s name, but Maryse just continues on. “Or your sister, even. I would expect it from them. But not from you, Alec. You’re supposed to be better than this.” Alec walks away, into the living room, and lets himself drop face down onto the couch. “Do you have any idea what would have happened if you’d been picked up by someone else? By officers who don’t know your father? You’d have an _arrest record_. Do you understand what I’m saying to you? It would ruin everything you’ve ever worked towards. Are you even listening to me?”

“Yes," says Alec. But he’s so tired, his bones are sinking into the couch. He just needs to sleep. He’ll deal with all of this after he sleeps.

“I don’t even know who you are anymore,” Mother says.

“Me neither,” he says wistfully.  And then he’s asleep.

 

**Jace, 20**

“Nah,” Lyle says. “Just take a few Oxy. That should do it.”

Jace takes a couple from the bottle Lyle offers. “Thanks.”

“The Desoxyn is really only good for when you’re coming down. Ain’t gonna get you far with a headache.”

Jace washes the pills down the with a warm beer. His head is throbbing. Sleep has been more and more elusive the past few weeks, and it’s finally catching up with him. The little hammers that ping across his brain when he gets too tired are getting louder and louder. Jace looks around. They’d been instructed by a member of his father’s crew to meet here at 10PM, but there’s no sign of Michael so he and Lyle are just killing time.

“Why you always got a headache, man?” Lyle asks.

“Don’t sleep,” Jace says. “I dunno. I’ve never been able to sleep much, but the headaches are new.”

“You need to get laid.”

“Sure,” Jace says, rolling his eyes.

“I’m serious bro! Get your dick sucked. That’ll get rid of your migraine. That’s fucking science.”

“Is there anything you don’t think fucking will fix?”

Lyle considers, then shakes his head. “Ain’t nothing it can hurt worse.” He laughs uproariously at his own joke. Jace chuckles, downing the rest of the beer. “How ‘bout Audrey? She’d suck your dick if you asked.”

“I’m good,” Jace says. “Thanks for your concern though.”

Lyle shakes his head, throwing up his hands. “Lord, boy. Well, I tried.”

The basement door opens and Michael calls down. “Boys?”

“What’s up, boss?” Lyle yells back.

Michael comes downstairs. “Good. You’re here.”

“We come when we’re called,” Jace says. He does wish his head wasn’t fucking pounding. He needs the Oxy to kick in.  

“Got a little errand for you. Think I’m going to come along too, if you don’t mind an old man’s company.”

Lyle shrugs. Jace wonders what he’s cooking up - Michael never came on collection runs or drops with them. He didn’t get his hands dirty, that’s what Jace and Lyle and the rest of them were for. Maybe it’s an important dealer, or a meeting or something, and he just wants Jace and Lyle to come stand imposingly behind him while he talks. Thrilling stuff.

“You carrying?”

“Always,” Lyle says.

“Jace?” Michael asks. Jace nods. He’d taken to carrying the 9mm full time, instead of leaving it at the bar. He didn’t see the difference. And Lyle kept his on him.

Michael is jovial on the ride to Antioch, twisting around in the passenger seat to talk to Jace, and fiddling with the radio. He seems keyed up, excited for whatever it is they’re doing. Antioch is on the outskirts of Nashville, and based on the amount of pleasure his father is taking in this trip, Jace assumes something fairly miserable is waiting for them.

“Wanna tell us what we’re walking into?” Lyle asks, as if he had read Jace’s mind.

“You know what I value more than anything, boys?” Michael asks, practically bouncing in his seat.

Jace shrugs but Lyle says, “Loyalty,” with the tone of someone who’s had this conversation before.

“Exactly. Loyalty. Everything else I can tolerate, but disloyalty marks a man for life. You’re not even a man anymore.”

Jace feels that perhaps this speech would be more effective if his dad hadn’t abandoned him as a kid. _That’s not fair_ he corrects himself. The headache is making him edgy and irritable.

“Always be striving for greatness, boys. That’s how I got where I am today. Always looking forward to the next thing. You have to have vision. And you have to know who has your back. Because people envy a man with vision. They feel threatened by him. And that’s when they’ll turn on you. Know who you can trust. That’s what matters most. Understand?”

“Yes, sir,” Lyle says.

“Jace?” Michael asks.

“What?”

“Do you understand what I’m saying to you?”

Jace nods. Michael looks like he’s considering saying something else to him, but then he turns back around in his seat.

“We’re going to visit an old business partner of mine. Someone I thought was a friend, who I thought had my back. But then he betrayed me. Stole from me. And now he has the audacity to ask for a second chance. To come back and lie to my face, saying he didn’t do it. Do I give people second chances, Lyle?”

“No, sir.”

“So we’re going to go have a chat with him about why he thinks he deserves one.”

“Understood,” says Lyle.

Jace has a bad feeling about this whole thing, and it only gets worse the closer they get to Antioch. It’s dark now, and Jace doesn’t like the way Michael is spinning the chamber of his gun in the front seat.

Finally, the pull up in front of the house. It’s in a strip of identical projects, definitely Section 8. “Don’t think you’re going to get a lot of money out of his guy,” Jace says.

“He has it,” Michael says. “Let’s go.”

Michael approaches the door, flanked by Jace and Lyle on either side of him. A dog is barking angrily from the yard next to them, trying to jump the fence. Michael puts his hand on his gun, and instinctively Jace does the same. Michael pounds on the door.

No one answers. He turns to Jace. “Break it down.”

Jace steps back and kicks the door, just above the lock. It splinters. His second kick opens it and he steps back, letting Michael go first.

“Heyyyyy Billy?” Michael calls out. “I know you’re here, brother.” Michael looks over his shoulder at Jace and Lyle. “Split up and search the house. If you find anyone bring them into the living room.” Lyle nods and goes left, so Jace moves to the back of the house. Fuck. He pulls his gun, keeping it up as he kicks open the first door he comes to. It’s a bedroom, deserted. He moves on. Bathroom has nothing. Outside the next door, he can hear a TV blaring. He takes a deep breath and kicks the door in, pointing the gun. He feels fucking stupid, like he’s just imitating shit he’s seen on TV. He shouldn’t be here. Sitting on the floor is a kid. A little girl. She stares up at Jace, wide-eyed, unfazed by the gun and his intrusion. Jace quickly steps into the bedroom and shuts the door behind him.

“Are you alone in the house?”

She shakes her head.

Jace kneels down next to her. “Is there anyone else in this room?”

She shakes her head again. He hears yelling from the other room of the house. Sounds like they found Billy. “Okay. Okay.” Jace says, trying to think through his fucking headache. “What’s your name?”

“Madzie,” whispers the little girl.

“Okay. My name is Jace. I’m not gonna hurt you, okay?” He puts the gun away, raising his empty hands to show her. “Don’t be scared, Madzie.”

She nods, her eyes widening even further. There’s a thudding sound from the living room that Jace knows from years of experience can only be caused by flesh hitting flesh. Hard. “Can you do something for me? We’re gonna play a game. Kind of like hide and seek, okay?”

Madzie nods again and Jace takes her hand, standing up. “You’re going to get in this closet, here, okay?” he whispers.

“Jace! Jace! Get in here!” Michael yells from the other room. He sounds like he’s laughing.

Obediently Madzie follows him to the closet, and Jace pulls the door almost shut. “You’re going to stay in here for as long as you can, okay? Can you count to a thousand?”

“Higher,” she says.

“Okay. Count as high as you can. And no matter what you hear, just keep counting. And then you can come out, and don’t go into the living room, okay? Go out the back and find another grown up. Okay?”

She nods, deadly serious, more serious than a little girl should ever have to be. Jace can imagine exactly what her young eyes have already seen, because his saw them too. His father is screaming for him again from the other room. “Start counting.” He shuts the closet door and runs back into the living room.

Lyle is standing over a man who can only be Billy. He’s badly beaten, bleeding. Jace looks to Michael. “The fuck were you?” Michael says.

“Looking for money,” Jace lies.

“Find anything?”

Jace shakes his head.

“Anyone else here?”

“No.”

Michael stares at him for a long moment. “Okay. Jace, Billy was just telling me how sorry he was that things didn’t work out last time. But unfortunately sorry don’t pay the bills, Billy boy.” Lyle is holding Billy by the collar.

Michael nods to Jace. “Go ahead.”

Jace looks at Michael. “Go ahead what?”

“It’s your turn.”

Lyle laughs, throwing Billy down to the ground and stepping back.

Billy staggers back up to his feet. “Michael -”

“Are you gonna tell me where the money is?

Billy shakes his head. “There’s no money -”

“Then don’t fucking speak to me,” Michael says. “Jace?”

Jace looks at Billy, his face already split, eye swollen. He looks back to his father.

“Jace. Now.”

For one horrible second, Jace is seven years old again, back in that apartment in Brooklyn, standing over a cowering, crying puppy. “Do it, Jace, now!”

Jace crosses the room and kicks Billy hard in the chest. He goes back down, and Jace falls on him, punching blindly.

“Good, good!” he hears Michael yell, laughing. “That’s my boy.”

Jace stands. “Get up,” he says to Billy. And he does. So Jace goes again, hitting Billy over and over until his knuckles bleed. Billy doesn’t even try to block the blows. Just takes them numbly. Jace kicks him in the chest again and he falls back, slamming his head against the floor. It’s like fighting a rag doll.

“Good,” Michael says. Jace stands, catching his breath. “I’m not asking again, Billy. If you want a second chance, you gotta clear the slate. So where’s my money?”

Billy shakes his head. “I told you, I don’t -”

“Wrong answer.” says Michael. He shoots him in the kneecap. Billy screams.

Billy is writhing on the floor and Michael stands over him, pointing the gun at his head. Jace feels a sick, swooping flash of dread. “You ever ask me for anything again,” Michael breathes, “the next one’s going in your head.” And then he slams the butt of the gun into Billy’s temple and he crumples, unconscious.

“Let’s go.” Michael says.

“What about the money?” Lyle asks.

“Never thought he had it,” Michael explains. “He wouldn’t have come crawling back to me if he wasn’t fucking broke. It’s the principle of the thing.”

Lyle laughs, as if there was anything remotely amusing about the situation.

“C’mon,” Jace says. He just wants to get out of there. His heart is pounding in his chest and he fucking prays that Madzie is still counting. He prays that she won’t find her father like this.

“In a hurry, son?” Michael asks.

“Yeah, you just fucking shot a guy. It’s a fucking crime scene. Let’s get out of here.”

Lyle claps him on the shoulder. “Aww, is your boy a virgin?”

Michael stares at Jace. “He’ll learn,” he says, voice ice cold. “He’ll learn.”

***

Jace is standing in the steaming shower, watching the blood on his hands turn pale pink and stream down the drain, like a perverse sort of baptism. Maryse and Robert had had him baptized after his adoption. They made a big deal about it, and while he’d found the whole thing a bit bemusing, he’d appreciated that they wanted him to be a part of something that meant so much to them. And now here he was being baptized again, this time as Michael’s son. A baptism of blood and too-hot water and self-loathing. It wasn’t like he’d never beat someone up before. Hell, he’d beat up people who probably deserved it way less than Billy. That’s not what bothered him; fighting was one of the only things he was good for. No, the thing that truly disgusted him was that he’d done it on command, like a pit bull taught to kill, like a weapon at his father’s disposal.

He runs his hands through his hair and then turns off the water. It seems like it would require an enormous amount of energy to actually get out of the shower, so he just stands there for a while, dripping. Eventually he sinks down to the hard tile and lets his head rest against his knees, making his body small, holding it together. _C’mon._ He tries to gather himself. _Take a breath. Check your feet. Keep your head up_. But for once he finds no comfort in the refrain. His phone, abandoned on the counter, buzzes twice. Three times. Four times. Five. Jesus. He’s probably being summoned by Lyle or Michael, despite the late hour. Jace reaches up to grab it, and is shocked to see that all five messages are from Izzy. Well. Jace figures he can’t feel much worse than he already does, so he opens the texts.

iMessage: Izzy Lightwood _to_ Jace Wayland:

  * (12:34AM) Ok Jace listen up  
  * (12:34AM) Unless ur literally dead in a fucking ditch somewhere i need you to call me
  * (12:35AM) Im really scared for Alec, its bad.
  * (12:35AM) Please. You never have to speak to me again after this promise
  * (12:37AM) But he needs you



Never mind. He absolutely feels worse. It’s like getting caught in a riptide. His other life, his _real_ life, comes rushing back in, and the intensity of his feelings, his concern, his anger, slams into him.  _God. What was wrong with Alec? Was it Magnus? Had Magnus hurt him in some way?_

Slowly, Jace stands up and walks into his bedroom. He pulls on a pair of sweats and sits at the foot of his bed, considering. And then he calls Izzy.

“Jace? Oh my god,” she says.

“Hi, Izzy.”

“So. You’re not dead then. That’s good.”

“Thank you,” Jace says, regretting this already.

“Sorry. I’m sorry. That was bitchy. I just. Fuck, it’s all so fucked up, J.” He hears the waver in her voice and realizes how profoundly upset she is by whatever is going on. Fear hits him like a tidal wave. He needs to know.  

“What’s fucked up? What’s going on with Alec?” he demands.

“You haven’t seen...anything? Heard anything?”

“No? What am I supposed to have seen?” Why was Izzy so incapable of delivering information directly?

“Jesus, you really did cut us out. Um, I guess I’ll start at the beginning then. So, Alec got outted.”

“What?!” Jace spits.

“Yep. Paparazzi photos of Alec and Magnus leaked, literally the day you left. Pictures of them kissing. The Senator totally flipped. Convinced Alec he was ruining the family, and his own life, and that he was making a mistake dating Magnus. It really fucked with his head. So Alec broke up with him.”

“Oh, Alec…”

“I know. Just wait. Did you know they had sex?”

“How would I know that?” He sighs. “Jesus,” Jace says, an odd mixture of defensiveness and anger and heartbreak brewing in his stomach.

“I know, I know. Anyway. Alec doesn’t just dump Magnus, he goes and gets a girlfriend. And he’s pretending he it's fine and walking around like a fucking Stepford Wife - or Stepford Husband, I guess, is that a thing?”

“I’m sorry, did you say he has a girlfriend?” Jace wonders if this is an elaborate and incredibly ill-conceived prank.

 “Yep. The Senator set them up. Image rehab. Al claims it was his choice, but like. He’s clearly miserable, he’s been drinking himself under the fucking table and totally shutting me out. I just can’t tell,  you know, how bad it really is, I’m out here with this stupid internship. And I don’t even know if this is the right thing to do, I don’t know if he wants to talk to you or if you can help at this point but I don’t have anyone else to talk to and I’m scared -” her voice breaks.

Jace is silent for a moment. He doesn’t know what to say, his brain weighed down with rage; at Robert, at Maryse, at Alec, at _himself_. “Fuck,” he settles on finally.

“I know. I just - you two told me I didn't have to do everything alone. So I'm not. I’m asking for help. Please. And I know you’re mad at us but -”

“I’m not mad at you. Or Alec,” Jace says, and it’s only as he says it that he realizes he truly means it.

“Really?” Izzy says, her sarcasm tinged with real hurt. “Because you’ve been doing a pretty convincing impression of someone who hates both of us for the past month.”

Jace burns with shame. He’s been so selfish. He’d had no idea what Alec was going through while he sat on his ass down here drinking beer with Lyle. How could Alec not have told him?! _He tried,_ he reminds himself. _He tried and you ignored him._

“Okay,” he says, “I’ll call him. I’ll call him tomorrow.”

“Do it now, Jace, please.”

“He’s probably asleep -”

“Jace -”

“Okay. I’ll call him tonight.”

“Thank you,” Izzy says, the relief in her voice palpable. “I’m sorry, I know you wanted us to leave you alone.”

“No,” Jace says, “No. Thank you for telling me.”

“Are you doing okay? How is it, being with your dad?”

Jace gives a weird strangled little laugh. He’s not sure he’s ever made that noise before. “It’s good. I’m good.”

“What’s he like?” she asks.

Jace suddenly feels like crying and desperately needs to hang up before Izzy can continue being kind. “I’m going to call Alec. I’ll talk to you later.”

“Wait, Jace, there’s something else -”

“I’m sorry.” Jace hangs up quickly.

Jace stays perched on the foot of his bed, staring at his phone like it’s a snake poised to bite him. Hearing Izzy’s voice again had shaken something loose inside of him. He didn’t know what it was, but it felt physically painful. And Alec. God. What was Alec thinking? He feels a surge of impotent rage at Robert, and the image of him beating the shit out of Robert flashes across his mind. He flexes his hand, which is shaking slightly. His heart breaks for Alec; he knew what it had cost him to make that leap, to admit to himself, and to Jace and Izzy, what he wanted. And then to immediately have it all snatched out from under him. It was cruel. Robert’s blind ambition continued to know no bounds, not even when the cost was his children’s happiness. The Senator preferred secrets and lies, and it seemed that Maryse didn’t have the spine to stand up to him.

He lays back on his bed, spread-eagled, and calls Alec. It rings and rings. _He won’t answer_ , he thinks. _He’s asleep_. It goes to voicemail and he hangs up. Jace hates himself for feeling relieved.

 

**Alec, 20**

Alec follows Lydia upstairs to her townhouse in DC. They’re returning from a fundraiser at the MoMA, and they’d decided early on in their arrangement (but not too early, of course, for propriety) that it would be good for Alec to come and go from Lydia’s place a few times a week. Just for the sake of doing the thing properly. And while they went so far as to sleep in her bed together, the whole thing felt reminiscent of pre-pubescent sleepovers. They would chat for a bit and then both fall asleep, staying on their respective sides of the bed.

“I cannot _believe_ they served that chicken, can you? It was practically inedible,” Lydia says, pulling her heels off as Alec shuts the door behind them.

“Mh,” Alec says, removing his tuxedo jacket.

“What time is it?” she asks. “Can you unzip me?”

Alec pulls out his phone as he walks towards her, and then freezes. He has a missed call from Jace. That can’t be right. But he looks at it again, and it says, quite plainly - _Missed Call. Jace Wayland. 12:45AM._

“What?” Lydia asks. “What’s wrong?”

“Uh, nothing.” Alec says, his mind racing. He unzips her dress. “It’s almost 1.”

“Ugh. I’m going to bed. I have 6AM SoulCycle. You coming?”

“To SoulCycle? God, no.”

Lydia rolls her eyes. “No, to bed.”

“Oh. Yes. Um. I need to make a phone call first.”

“At this hour?”

“Family stuff,” Alec says, willing her to leave him alone. “I’m going outside.”

Lydia shrugs and goes into her bedroom.

Alec steps out onto her balcony, closing the French doors behind him. His heart is pounding in his chest. He calls back, and Jace answers on the first ring.

“Hello?” Jace says. Something strange happens in his stomach at the sound of Jace’s voice.

“Jace? Are you okay?”

“What? Yeah. I’m fine. Did I wake you up?”

“No, no. I was at this fundraiser thing. It doesn’t matter. What’s up?”

“Um. Izzy called me.”

“Oh?” Alec asks, his voice unusually high.

“Yeah. Because she’s really fucking worried about you. And I am too.”

All of Alec’s excitement at talking to Jace again is seeping out of him, like air from a balloon. Jace wasn’t calling because he _wanted_ to. He didn’t want to talk to Alec, didn’t need him. No, he was calling because Izzy had guilt tripped him into checking on him, like he was a misbehaving toddler they were trying to co-parent after a particularly messy divorce. He sighs. “C’mon, you know how dramatic Izzy is. I’m fine. You don’t have to worry about me.”

“Really? Tell me about your girlfriend.”

“It’s a short term political arrangement. And it’s going very well,” Alec says, hearing how defensive he sounds.

“Jesus, you sound just like him.”

“Who?”

“The Senator,” Jace says bitterly. “Tell me he put you up to all this.”

“It’s all been my choice, Jace, no matter what Izzy told you.”

“She also said you’re drinking. A lot.”

“Pot, fucking kettle,” Alec sneers.

He can hear Jace exhale. “Right. Well. I’m really sorry I bothered you. I wouldn’t want to get in the way of this one-man self destruction act you’ve got going on.”

Alec makes a noise somewhere between a laugh and a sob. “Don’t come in here and try to lecture me Jace, like you have any fucking idea - you haven’t been here. You don’t know.”

“So then tell me!” Jace is shouting now. “I didn’t call to lecture you, you’re a grown ass man. Date whoever you want. I just want to know why you’re lying to yourself. Do you seriously care more about what people think of you then about living your own fucking life?”

“I’m not you, Jace,” Alec says venomously. “I can’t just do whatever I want all the time and not expect there to be consequences.”

“I don’t do that!”

“Seriously? Because you just did. You took off! You left us. You left _me_.”

“I was going to find my FATHER,” Jace yells. “Who, in case you don’t remember, I thought was dead. It’s kind of been a big deal.”

“Well, I wouldn’t know, would I?  But I do know that if you had asked for help, I would have been there for you. I would have been right fucking there.”

“What are you talking about, you never asked for help!”

“I tried,” Alec says, voice breaking. From the way he hears Jace swallow, it’s clear Jace knows he’s right. “I needed you. I needed you, and I tried to reach you, and you didn’t come. And now it’s too late.”

“So I ignored a few texts from you, you could have tried harder -”

“I’m not going to grovel at your feet. Not anymore, Jace.”

“When have you ever _groveled_?”

“My whole life. My whole life, I always needed more from you than you did from me. But not anymore. You wanted out and now so do I. I’m done, Jace.”

“You’re fucking out of your mind. I don’t even know what you’re talking about anymore.”

“You should go. Don’t want to keep you from father-son bonding time.”

“Thanks, that’s really considerate of you,” Jace says, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

Alec, hurt and cornered, lashes out. “While you’re hanging out with dear old dad, why don’t you ask him why he abandoned you as a kid? Why don’t you ask him why he kicked you around? Why he let you go hungry, all those nights, while he shot up in the living room -” he stops, realizing he’s gone too far. But Jace has already hung up.

Alec stays on the balcony, watching the city below him and wondering if this time he’s truly lost Jace forever. After a while he’s surprised to discover that he feels absolutely nothing. Just a dull void where a boy had once been. He goes back inside to join Lydia.

“Everything okay?” she asks as he lays down next to her on top of the covers, not even bothering to undress.

“Yes.”

She props herself up on her elbows. “Alec? What’s wrong?”

He turns over, away from her. “Please, for once in your life, just shut up.”

Lydia makes an affronted little gasp, but at least she doesn’t say anything else. She lays back down, turning off the bedside lamp.

Alec lays there all night, watching passing headlights through the curtains and desperately waiting to feel anything other than this terrifying sense of emptiness. But it never comes, even as the sun starts to rise on another day.

 


	3. Ghost

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi! sorry this chapter took so long, i had to do a lot of writing at work so i didn't have time for the important things aka gay fic
> 
> fyi, the last chapter is a short epilogue, so ill try to have that up at the end of this week. thanks for reading, let me know what you think xoxo

******Jace, 19**

“So obviously we’re all agreed that Jace is _not_ allowed to drive, right?” Izzy is sitting cross-legged on the roof of her Prius texting while he and Alec try to cram what may well be her 23rd suitcase into the trunk.

“Really hurtful,” Jace says with a grunt as he shoves the suitcase. “Just untoward.”

 “You need to move that lampshade,” Alec says, wiping his brow with one hand and keeping a bag of hangers from falling out with the other.

 “Why the fuck are you bringing a _lampshade_?” Jace demands.

 “To put on a lamp,” Izzy says, not looking up from her phone.

 Alec rolls his eyes at Jace. “Can you please get down and help us? Considering this is all your shit?”

 “I’m bad at spatial relations,” Izzy waves him off.

 “Yeah well so is Jace. That’s why he’s such a bad driver,” Alec says, ducking his head back into the trunk.

 “I have incredible body awareness, actually,” Jace says.

 “Truly does not apply here.” Alec’s voice is muffled by the trunk. “Okay hard line Iz, you can’t take - arGHHH,” he screeches as Jace tackles him around the middle, pulling Alec down onto the lawn with him. The two wrestle on the grass, Alec shrieking indignantly while Jace laughs. He pins Alec under him, holding his arms down.

 “Look at that,” Jace says. “Excellent body control _and_ spatial awareness. Admit it.”

 “I will not,” Alec says passionately, squirming under him.

 “Goddamit boys,” Izzy calls lazily.

 Jace tightens his grip on Alec. “Admit I’m right and I’ll let you go.”

 “Never,” Alec says.

 “Too bad, we just have to die here I guess.” Jace says, sitting back on his heels without releasing Alec’s arms.

 “Fine by me,” Alec says, biting his lip. “I got nowhere to be.”

 “Guys!” Izzy says, jumping down from her perch. “This trunk isn’t going to pack itself.”

 Jace looks over his shoulder back at her. “I don’t want to shock you, but you know you actually could do it yourself, right?” He can feel Alec shake with laughter beneath him.

 “But then what’s the point of having brothers?”

 Jace sighs dramatically and rolls to his feet, pulling Alec up after him. “This isn’t over,” he tells Alec.

 “You’re still not allowed to drive,” Alec laughs.

The amble back over to the car, parked on the driveway in the shadow of their home. Izzy surveys the situation. “Okay. I’m going to do something I rarely do and concede that it’s possible I slightly overpacked.”

“Slightly,” Alec repeats in disbelief.

“Yeah, you do know they have stores in Nashville, right? You can buy shit there?” Jace says.

Izzy sighs mournfully. “Okay. Ditch the armchair and see what happens.”

“I’m sorry there’s an _armchair_ in here?! Where!?” Alec says.

Still laughing, Jace climbs into the back seat to take another crack at it. He’s looking forward to driving Izzy to Vanderbilt for freshman orientation, but that doesn’t change the fact that they have a full day’s drive ahead of them, and they’re not going anywhere fast. “We could take two cars,” Jace suggests. “Then Al and I could drive the other back, instead of flying.”

“No,” Izzy says quickly. “I want us to all drive together. I can take some stuff out.” Izzy turns away and Jace and Alec exchange a quick smile. Izzy’s been putting on a brave front, but they suspect she’s nervous about being so far away from them. Of course, they’ve been in Boston for the past two years, but that was close enough that Izzy managed to turn up at their apartment fairly frequently (and usually unannounced). Only profound separation anxiety could motivate Izzy to concede she had overpacked.

After some soul-searching, Izzy manages to downsize enough to get them on the road. Alec drives, with Jace in the front seat. Izzy agreed to be in the backseat if she could control the AUX cord, and she’s been blasting some truly horrifying pop music for the past few hours.

“What is this?” Alec groans as another song starts.

“Little Things! Obviously!” Izzy says.

Jace shakes his head. “Don’t ask.”

Izzy turns down the music. “I’m starving.”

“We’ve only been driving for two hours,” Alec says.

“So? I can’t be starving after two hours?”

“I could eat,” Jace says.

“You can always eat,” mutters Alec.

“Great, majority rules,” Izzy says, looking at her phone. “There’s a diner in 15 miles.”

“We’re literally never going to get to Nashville,” Alec sighs.

“That’s fine,” Izzy says distractedly.

“Nervous, Iz?” Jace asks.

“No,” she says hotly.

“It’s okay if you are. Jace was nervous before school.”

“No I wasn’t,” Jace says. Alec gives him a purposeful look. “I mean, yeah, of course I was a little nervous. Everyone is,” Jace corrects himself, picking up on Alec’s intention.

“I’m not nervous about academics, or anything like that. And of course I’ll make friends,” she says.

“Yeah, that’s really never been a problem for you,” Jace says.

“I dunno. What if everyone sucks? What if my dorm sucks? What if the food sucks? What if my roommates suck?”

“Lot of potential for sucking,” Jace concedes.

“What if something bad happens and I’m all alone down there?” she says, quieter now.

Ah. So now she’d gotten to it. Jace turns around to face Izzy, who’s cramped in amongst all her suitcases. It has the rare effect of making her look small and somewhat vulnerable.

“What kind of bad?” Jace asks gently.

“I dunno. I do dumb shit sometimes,” she picks at the hem of her shirt. “I just like knowing you guys are close.”

Alec laughs. “Do you want an itemized list of all the dumb shit Jace did just last semester?”

“Rude,” Jace says. “But fair. The point is, you’re allowed to fuck up. You don’t have to be perfect, Izzy, no matter what Maryse told you. And we’re never that far away. Remember the deal?” Jace continues. “The three of us, we’re in it for life. Doesn’t matter where we all are, or what else is going on. We’ll always come for each other. Okay?”

“Seriously,” Alec says. “Say the word and we’ll be there.”

Izzy nods, smiling a little.

“And if anyone gives you trouble - you remember all those combos we ran this summer, right? Your right hook is gonna bring Nashville to it’s _knees_.”

“Very true,” Alec agrees. “You’re better than me.”

“Well, that’s not hard,” Jace says, unable to help himself. “Anyway, as your elder brothers we give you universal permission to punch anyone who deserves it.”

“Okay, I mean, maybe we shouldn’t _start_ with punching,” Alec says. “Maybe let’s incorporate some of our other conflict resolution skills first.”

Jace fronts an exaggerated look of contemplation for Izzy’s benefit. “Hmm. No. Punching is good. You have our blessing.”

Izzy laughs. “I love you guys. I’m really gonna miss you.”

“We’re gonna miss you too. But nothing’s gonna change.” Alec says.

“We’ll come visit you.”

“Yeah!” Alec agrees. “And you’ll be home for Thanksgiving, right? That’s not so far off.”

“That was the exit for the diner, by the way,” Izzy says as they blow past it.

“C’mon! Give a guy a little warning!”

“Now who’s a bad driver?” Jace demands.

“That is completely different, this was Izzy’s fault,” Alec starts in. As he had hoped, Jace manages to distract Izzy by bickering with Alec, making her laugh until they finally find their way back to the diner.

“How much farther?” Izzy asks as she drops into a booth at the restaurant. Jace slides in next to her and Alec sits across from them.

“Once again, we have only been driving for two hours,” Alec says, shaking his head.

“We should play some road trip games,” Izzy says brightly, seeming over her bout of nerves. “Like the one where someone says a category and then you have to say a thing in that category for every letter of the alphabet and everyone has to remember. Or the one where you say an actor and then you have to say a movie they were in and then you say someone else from _that_ movie -”

“I’m not doing any of that,” Alec interrupts.

“Sorry, I forgot you have a strict no-fun policy,” Izzy says.

Jace laughs. “Fun distracts from the brooding, obviously. Looking handsome and sulky is a full time job. Those eyebrows don’t furrow themselves.” Izzy laughs, but Alec gives him an odd look, his face protected. “See look he’s doing it now. C’mon Al,” Jace says, bumping his knee against Alec’s under the table. “I’m just teasing you.”

Alec cracks a smile, but it seems slightly forced. _What was up with him lately?_ All summer, Alec’s face slipped more and more often into that closed off place. He wondered what he wasn’t telling him. He was sure Alec would fill him in eventually, he just hoped he wasn’t being too hard on himself in the meantime. Alec had a knack for finding ways to torture himself. They’d both interned at a nonprofit that provided legal support to women-run startups this summer, and while Jace had spent three months running around with Cassie, their supervisor, Alec had clocked a lot of unnecessarily late nights in the office. He’d have to keep an eye on him this semester, make sure Alec had _some_ fun.

A pretty blonde waitress slides up to their table. “Hi y’all, my name is Missy. What can I get started for you?”

Jace immediately looks up with interest. “Hey,” he says, dropping his voice. “I’m Jace. How’s your day going?”

She smiles. “Better now. How about you, Jace?”

“Excellent. We’re taking our sister to college,” Jace says, nodding at Izzy.

“So just passing through? That’s too bad.” She clicks her tongue with a suggestive smile. He sees Alec roll his eyes at Iz.

“We’re not in a hurry,” Jace says, leaning back a bit so he’s sure she can see his arms properly.

“Can I get a coffee?” Alec interrupts. Jace kicks him under the table.

“Oh, sure,” Missy says, taking out her pad. “What else for ya?”

Alec and Izzy order while Jace quickly scans the menu. “Can I just get a six egg omelette, with whatever veggies you have and some meat? Toast and potatoes on the side,” Jace says.

“Any meat at all?” she asks, laughing.

“I’m easy,” Jace says.

“And hungry,” she quips back, and he watches her eyes scan his body. “You a bodybuilder or something?”

“Boxer,” Jace says.

“Wow. Maybe you can show me some moves,” she winks. “I’ll put this in.”

“Thanks,” Izzy says, barely suppressing a laugh.

“Seriously?” Alec hisses, gesturing at the waitress as she struts back to the kitchen, looking over her shoulder at Jace to make sure he’s watching.

“What?” Jace says. “She’s cute.”

“You’re incorrigible,” Izzy says.

“And you’re already too smart. I think you should just skip this whole college thing, you’re just going to embarrass everyone else,” Jace replies.

“Also, you’re _supposed_ to have a girlfriend,” Alec says, glaring at Jace.

“Who, Cassie? She’s not my girlfriend.” Jace says, outraged.

“Um, I think she would beg to differ,” Alec says.

“Ah well, that’s her problem. I told her I wasn’t looking for anything serious,” Jace shrugs.

“Are you ever?” Izzy asks.

“Am I ever what?” 

“Looking for a serious relationship. Honestly, when was the last time you dated someone properly? Instead of just slutting around New England,” Izzy asks.

Izzy and Alec are both looking at him, and he feels suddenly defensive. “I’ve dated people seriously.” Alec looks away, scanning the restaurant and jiggling his foot under the table. “I dated Becca for like two years!” Jace says.

“First of all, it was 14 months _at most_ , second of all, you were in high school,” Izzy retorts. She’s clearly not going to drop it. She loves trying to solve non-existent problems. “You haven’t dated anyone in ages.”

“I’m doing just fine for myself, thanks,” Jace says, silently willing her to move on. Alec looks uncomfortable. Any discussion of dating or sex tended to make Alec vaguely anxious, so both Jace and Izzy generally tried not to dwell on it by unspoken agreement. But apparently Izzy was on a tear today, trying to fix one more (completely unbroken) aspect of his life before she left for school.

“Don’t you ever want to settle down?” she presses. “You know, get married, have some kids, that whole thing?”

“I’m nineteen, Isabelle.”

“I’m not talking about getting married _tomorrow_ ,” Izzy says, chewing on a straw. “But eventually. Don’t you want that?”

Jace sighs. “Of course I do.” At the moment he was mostly focused on shutting Izzy up, but she had inadvertently hit on the thing he actually _did_ want more than anything. Ever since he had been adopted by the Lightwoods, by a _real_ family, he had been focused on having one of his own. He loved being in their family, obviously, but he could never quite shake the feeling that he was always a bit of an afterthought, a stray who had come to the door one night and been grudgingly taken in. Something you grabbed from the bargain bin in line and regretted buying before you were even home from the store. Robert and Maryse didn’t treat him that way intentionally - _okay, maybe Robert did_ \- and Al and Izzy certainly never did. But still. He wanted a family of his _own_. One that hadn’t come to him by sheer chance. He wanted a family that felt intentional. That was his, that he had started, that was permanent. Even after all this time, the fear that the Lightwoods would one day revoke his membership haunted him. He knew it wasn’t fair to them, and he never told Alec and Izzy this, but you couldn’t live as transiently as Jace had as a child and expect to take to permanence with any kind of confidence.

He also felt an intense pull towards the idea of being a father, having children of his own running around under his watchful gaze. His father had been wonderful, and he loomed so large in Jace’s memories with his booming laugh and rabble-rousing spirit. He filled a room. But he was dead, and the void he had left behind had been just as formative to Jace as his presence. He wouldn’t let his child grow up with a void. He would be even better than his dad, more consistent and unwavering.

With a jolt, he realizes Izzy has been talking for awhile. “ - and obviously you’re both young but I just think that if you’re not conscientious about this, it’s going to be harder to change your ways when you’re older. And then where will you be? I can’t have two 40 year old bachelors living in my basement.”

“Wait, why not?” Jace says, jokingly, trying to bring Alec along. “That sounds perfect. You do all the work, Al and I will just mooch off you.”

Alec laughs, and fortunately Missy arrives with their food then, distracting Izzy from her tirade.

 ***

They stay at a hotel that night in Nashville, and spend all morning helping Izzy set up her dorm. Or, more precisely, Jace spent all morning being directed to perform various feats of manual labor, while Alec and Izzy did the fun shit.

“This is fucking bullshit,” he mutters, bent over an IKEA bookshelf one of her roommates had bought. “Gonna sell a goddamn shelf without any instructions like we’re all a bunch of goddamn Swedish construction proteges.”

Alec laughs at him, but one of Izzy’s roommates (he had immediately forgotten all of their names), drifts over. “I can take a look at it,” she offers, smiling. “I’m pretty handy.”

Izzy had expressly forbade him from flirting with any of her roommates on the drive over here, enumerating a series of unnecessarily graphic punishments should he slip up. Jace freezes. He’s not actually entirely sure he trusts himself to talk without flirting. “Um,” he says stiffly. “It’s fine. I’m fine.”

She shrugs a bit dejectedly and wanders off, leaving Jace to curse the Swedish in every combination of swear words he has available to him.

But finally they get the dorm set up to Izzy’s satisfaction. She and the other three girls in her suite seem to be getting along well, and Jace is confident she’ll be queen bee in about eight minutes. They meet the other girls’ parents, and if the absence of Senator and Mrs. Lightwood strikes them as odd, none of them mention it. Jace always felt Izzy had kind of gotten the short end of the stick in terms of parental attention. Robert and Maryse focused on Alec, their pride and joy and hope for the future, but Izzy had no real interest in politics or her mother’s various charity organizations, so they didn’t seem to have much use for her. Well. That’s what he and Alec were for. They linger around a bit, not wanting to say goodbye, but there’s really nothing left to do and eventually Izzy tells them they have to leave so she can go to her orientation lunch. Jace hugs her tightly.

“Don’t listen to your brother, use that right hook as much as you want. And you call me, anytime and I’ll be on a plane down here, okay?” Jace whispers in her ear. Izzy nods.

“Love you,” she whispers back.

“You too,” he kisses her on the forehead and steps back, surprised to find he’s slightly emotional about the goodbye. _You’ll see her soon, idiot_ , he tells himself. Alec apparently feels the same way, because Jace thinks there’s a bit of a shine in his eyes when he lets go of Izzy.

He and Alec head out, walking away from Vanderbilt’s campus and back towards their hotel. Jace tosses his arm around Alec’s shoulders. “Can’t believe our baby is all grown up and going off to college.” Alec shoves him off, shaking his head.

“We still have like four hours until we need to go to the airport,” Alec says, looking at his phone. “There’s supposed to be a really lovely botanical garden in Nashville, want to check it out?”

“Not at all,” Jace replies. He shoves his hands in his pockets, dodging clumps of tearful parents on the sidewalk. “What if we changed our flight?” he asks before he’s even realized he thought it.

“You wanna try to leave earlier?” Alec asks.

“No. I don’t want to go home. I want to go somewhere else. I don’t know. Let’s go somewhere, anywhere, for a few days. We don’t have to go back to Boston until Friday, right?” He knows exactly what he’s doing; dropping off Izzy was the last thing standing between him and returning to Harvard. And now that they’ve done it, the rapidly impending reality of another school year is hitting him. He’s not ready for another year at that place, not ready for the constant bullshit and posturing and hierarchy. And he’s having trouble wrapping his mind around being halfway through school. Halfway to graduation. Halfway to being supposed to know what the fuck he wanted to do with his life, what grand career he was going to pursue so he could prove the Lightwoods had made a good investment in him.

He wants to steal a few days out of time; they were done with their internships, Izzy was safe and set up, Maryse and Robert were in Istanbul. He feels a wild sense of freedom suddenly, like he and Alec could disappear off the face off the Earth, just the two of them together. They could hide from the world. “Please,” he says, grabbing Alec’s hands. “Let’s do it.”

Alec looks at him, considering. Jace bites his lip. “Pleaseeeeeee,” he whines in a high pitched tone he knows Alec hates.

“Only if you promise to stop saying please like that,” Alec says, shaking his head. But he’s smiling. “Where should we go?”

“Yes!” Jace throws his arms around Alec and hugs him. “Anywhere. Wherever you want.”

“Okay, okay, but you have to let go of me so I can check the airline website,” Alec says, laughing. He’s getting caught up in Jace’s excitement, throwing it back to him, and now Jace is riding high. “New York?” Alec says, looking at flights. “We can go to the apartment, or up to Bridgehampton. Ohh, or Miami. We can be in Miami for dinner. Or Austin. Dinner in Austin? No, let’s do New Orleans.”

Jace laughs, looping his arm through Alec’s. “Anywhere. Long as it’s me and you.” 

 

**Jace, 20**

The motel Michael directs him and Lyle to is sketchy as shit, but Jace presumes that’s the appeal of it. They’re supposed to wait there for a truck that’s driving up from Mexico with a shipment. What exactly it’s a shipment of nobody’s deigned to tell Jace, but he presumes it’s amphetamine related. Michael doesn’t trust the Mexican drivers so they have to meet at a neutral location, hence the motel. Which is all fine and well except the drivers had to wait out a border checkpoint and are delayed about six hours, so he and Lyle are cooped up in this shoebox of a room all night.

Lyle is watching TV with a slightly glazed expression. Jace wonders what he’s coming down from. He tries to watch with him but he’s too restless, doing pull ups on the closet bar until it snaps.

“Dude,” Lyle says, finally looking up at him. “Chill out.”

Jace rolls his eyes and stalks back over to Lyle, who’s laying on his stomach on the queen sized bed in the middle of the room. Jace sits at the other end. Eyes glued to the TV again, Lyle reaches into his pocket and fishes out a plastic bag of white powder. He passes it to Jace.

“This our heroin? Looks pure,” Jace asks, taking the bag.

“S’my cut from the batch for the whales.”

“Since when do you get a cut of the whales’ powder?” Jace asks.

“You accusing me of something?” Lyle says, lifting his head again.

“No. But I don’t get a cut.”

Lyle laughs, patting Jace condescendingly on the knee. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, kid. And since when are you usin’ enough to need your own cut?”

Jace shrugs. “I’m not. Just the principle of the thing.”

“You sound just like your daddy,” Lyle snorts. “Well lucky for you I’m feelin’ charitable. Cut some lines.”

Jace takes the bag, unsettled by Lyle’s assertion that he sounded like Michael. He wasn’t sure he wanted to be his father’s son. _Too late_ , he thinks, remembering the sound of Billy’s head smashing into the floor. He tips out some of the powder on the dirty bedside table, watching the crystalline flecks gather. They look almost pink in the light. _Definitely too late_. Robert had once told him that blood would tell. He hadn’t understood what it meant at the time, but now, as he sits in this shitty motel room with Lyle cutting lines, he gets it. It meant that Jace was always going to end up here. It was in his blood. No amount of divine intervention from the Lightwoods, no amount of money spent trying to polish him up, educate him, make him look the part, would ever change what was inside of him. Michael's blood had set the parameters Jace could live his life within before he had even been born. And Jace had defied the natural order of things for a while, posing as a Lightwood. Jace’s stomach turns, remembering his fight with Alec last week. Alec’s voice echoes in his head; _I always needed more from you than you did from me_.

Jace bows his head and snorts a line. It splinters through him, shattering his nervous system into a million pieces. Lyle rolls over to him, shoving him out of the way.

“You good?” Lyle asks as he bends towards the other line.

“Fine,” Jace says, his eyes watering. Lyle thumps him on the back.

“You’ll get used to it, kid.”

“You know you’re really not that much older than me,” Jace laughs. He’s almost instantly high, a feeling of numb euphoria spreading through him. The room gets soft around the edges, womb-like and warm.

“I’m 29.”

“Same difference,” Jace says, flopping down on his back on the bed. He closes his eyes. _I always needed more from you than you did from me._ Fucking hell. How could someone be so wrong about their own life? Whatever. It wasn’t his problem anymore. Alec had made it clear that he was done with him. _I needed you, and you didn’t come. And now it’s too late_.

“Listen,” Lyle is saying. Jace tries to swim back up to the surface of his thoughts.

“What?”

“Listen. Let’s fight again. I let you beat me last time.”

“You _let_ me beat you? Yeah fucking right.”

“Yeah man, I felt bad for you.”

“You’re so full of shit,” Jace laughs.

“Let’s go!” Lyle yelps, shrieking a war cry and staggering to his feet.

“Just gonna beat your ass again,” Jace says, climbing to his feet as well.

Standing up had certainly been a choice. He sways a little. He’s definitely higher than he’s been before, and he doesn’t quite know where his body ends and the room begins, but it’s okay. He sure knows how to fight. He tucks his elbows and squares off with Lyle. Lyle throws the first punch, but Jace ducks it easily, and then they’re sparring.

He can’t really track his movements, or Lyle’s, but he let’s himself roll on intuition. It feels a little like boxing underwater. He lands more punches than Lyle, although he takes a hard one in the gut that almost levels him. Jace’s survival instinct kicks in, overriding the heroin and putting him on the offensive, and he lands a few hard hits to gain the advantage. Lyle is laughing, which for some reason really pisses Jace off. Is Lyle laughing at him? He’s stronger than Lyle. He kicks Lyle’s legs out from underneath him, toppling him flat on his back and knocking the wind out of him. Lyle stays down and Jace straddles him to throw a knockout punch. He tilts off-balance as he pulls his shoulder back, and ends up pitching forward instead. Jace falls onto Lyle, face hovering above his shoulder. He wants to pull himself back up but he feels disoriented, unsure which way he’s supposed to move his body.

He can smell Lyle, a heady mix of sweat and Old Spice and cigarette smoke. For some reason it reminds him of Alec. It’s not that he smells _like_ Alec, but there’s something about it, something about the closeness of him, his sharply masculine physicality, that feels evocative. Jace freezes, panicked and confused. Alec. He needed Alec. His face is so close to Lyle’s.

Lyle shoves him, hard. “Get the fuck off me man, the fuck? You a fag?”

Jace’s head slams back into the metal bedframe. He’s confused, unable to ground himself. “No,” he says. “Fuck you.”

“Fucking laying on top of me like that,” Lyle mutters. “Jesus.” He kicks Jace, lightly, in the ribs. “I won.”

“You’re fucking crazy,” Jace says, pushing his hair out of his eyes. “I had you on your back.”

Lyle is still staring at him, his face strangely closed. Jace has the uncomfortable sensation of being picked apart. “What?” he says.

“You are a fag,” Lyle says slowly.  

Jace pulls himself up off the floor, moving back onto the bed. Lyle’s pissing him off, but his limbs are stuck in molasses and he doesn’t care enough to have this conversation with him.

“You don’t know shit,” Jace says.

“Don’t let Michael find out,”  Lyle warns, dragging himself to a sitting position. He leans against the wall, facing Jace.

Jace ignores him. His heart is still thumping. He’d felt Alec’s presence so strongly in that moment. It was like he’d been in the room with them. He’s overwhelmed, suddenly, by the need to get to him, to find Alec, to fix things. He couldn’t live like this. It’s like someone cut off a limb last week and he just realized he was bleeding out. _I’m so sorry, Alec. I’m so sorry_.

“How’d you manage to forgive him?” Lyle says finally.

“What?” Jace is still thinking of Alec, confused that Lyle somehow knows about their fight.

“How’d you forgive Michael. I never coulda done it.”

Jace shrugs. “It was a long time ago. He was an addict and he wanted me to have a better life, thought leaving me with them was the best way to do it.”

“No, no,” Lyle says, but then gets distracted by something and trails off, picking at the plasticky carpet.

“No, what?” Jace asks.

“What?” Lyle says.

Jace sighs. “What do you mean? About me forgiving Michael.”

“Oh. Yeah. I mean about your mom. And your sister.”

Jace sits up. There’s a weird slipping feeling inside of him, like he’s sliding down into sludge. Like in that movie Izzy loved, where the guy went through the sand to get the princess back. “What about them?”

“Don’t you hate him? What he did to them?”

“My mom and Clarissa died in a car crash. Celine was driving and the baby was in the car. They were both killed,” Jace recites dully.  

Lyle stares at Jace. “Dude. Do you not know?”

“The fuck are you saying?” Panic rises in his throat, choking him.

Lyle laughs. “Never mind, kid. Fuck. I ain’t telling you.”

Jace climbs off the bed, fear clearing his head a little. He grabs Lyle and shoves him back down to the ground, putting a knee to his throat. “Tell me,” Jace says.

“Jesus.” Lyle tries to shove Jace off him but he’s too high and Jace is stronger anyway. “You’re just as fucking crazy as him, you know that right?”

“Tell me,” Jace says again. Blood is pounding in his head.

Lyle stares up at him, lifting his chin in defiance. “Michael killed them. He shot your mom, and the baby.”

“Fuck you,” Jace says, slamming Lyle’s head against the floor.

“Fucking crazy,” Lyle groans.

“You’re lying,” Jace says, standing up.

“Why would I lie?” Lyle asks, getting to his feet as well and rubbing the back of his head. “I don’t give a shit.”

Jace backs away from him, needing to get out of the room, away from Lyle, away from his own body. He’s shaking his head. “No,” he says. “No.” He takes a shuddering breath. “Why?”

Lyle shrugs. “Dunno. Didn’t ask. Know he was fucking tweaked out of his mind. Told me the story as a warning about fucking around with meth, back when I first started out with him. Figured it wasn’t a secret.”

“Fuck you, man. This is fucked up.”

Lyle opens his arms in a shrug. “It’s the truth. Ask him yourself.”

Jace stares at him for a moment. Then he grabs the Lyle’s keys and opens the door. “Hey!” Lyle yells. “You’re not taking my truck.”

“Watch me,” Jace says, slamming the motel door behind him.

He’s thirty minutes outside of Nashville, and he drives in a daze, mind buzzing. He knows he shouldn’t be behind the wheel right now but anger and fear have sharpened his mind, cleared the fog and he’s so intent on getting to Michael that he feels nothing else.

Jace throws the door open, stalking in. Behind the bar, Audrey catches his eye. “Where’s Michael?” he demands.

“Office,” she says, looking at him oddly. “What’s wrong with you?”

Ignoring her, he shoves through the crowd, the doughy smell of beer heavy in the air.

Down the stairs. Nobody in the basement. He kicks the door of Michael’s office open and sure enough - he’s there. Daryl sits across from him, but Jace doesn’t care.

He pulls his 9mm from his jeans, pointing it squarely at Michael. “Tell me it’s not true,” he says, his breath heavy.

Daryl jumps to his feet, looking to Michael for instruction. But Michael is calm, seemingly unfazed by the fact that his son is pointing a gun at him. “Daryl,” he says simply, as if he they were all sitting around the dinner table, “why don’t you let me speak to my boy alone for a moment.”

Daryl looks back and forth between them. “Boss -”

“Leave us.”

Daryl hesitates a moment. Then grabs his beer and moves towards the door. “Shout if you need me,” he says.

Michael nods, not taking his eyes off Jace. The door shuts behind them.

“Tell me. Tell me it’s not true.”

Michael raises his hands slowly. “Why don’t you put down the gun so we can have a proper conversation.”

Jace’s hand is shaking, but he doesn’t move, doesn’t look away. “I said _tell me_.”

Michael leans back in his chair. “Okay. What should I tell you?”

“I know. I know you killed them. My mother, Clarissa. You shot them. Lyle told me.”

“Yes,” he says simply. “I did.” Jace is stunned. He had planned to beat the truth out of Michael, to tear the confession from him. He never dreamed Michael would just hand it to him. “And I have spent my entire life trying to make up for it. That’s why I let you live with the Lightwoods. I knew I didn’t deserve to be a father.”

“No,” Jace says shaking his head, realizing. “No, you let me live with them because they knew. You said they threatened to have you arrested if you came near me. They knew what you had done. You were saving your own fucking skin.”

“It was a complicated time, Jace. You are too young to understand -”

“Stop it,” Jace yells. “Stop fucking _lying_. Tell me why.” The gun is still shaking in his hand, but he hasn’t stopped pointing it at Michael.

“What are you going to do. Are you going to kill me?” Michael asks. Jace says nothing, breathing hard. “I don’t think you’re capable of it. You’ve always been weak. I thought I could change you, harden you up. But you’re weak.”

“Why did. You kill them.” Jace says. He has to know.

Michael sighs. “The baby wouldn’t stop crying. You can’t imagine what it’s like Jace, to be so dependent on meth. You lose yourself.” Jace thinks he’s going to throw up. “I was out of my mind. And Clarissa wouldn’t stop crying. Your mother tried to stop me. I killed her first. And then the baby. I just couldn’t stand the noise any longer.” His voice never wavers. “I didn’t realize what I had done for hours. Trust me, Jace. Please. You cannot possibly hate me more than I hate myself.”

“Why didn’t you kill me, too? Why stop there?” Jace spits.

“You were at a friend’s house,” Michael says, as if this whole thing were logical.

“And you fucking got away with it.”

“Jace. Nobody checks on people like us. Nobody cares what happens.”

“I care,” he says, his breath ragged. Jace wants to pull the trigger. He wants to kill Michael, more than he’s ever wanted anything before.

“You’ve been pointing that gun at me for an awful long time, son. Are you going to use it or not?”

“I hate you,” Jace says.

“I’m sure you do,” Michael agrees. “But I don’t think you’re going to kill me. I know you. You don’t have the discipline to go through with it.”

“You don’t know ANYTHING,” Jace says, his voice rising with every word.

“You’re my son,” he says simply. “I know you.

Jace is still holding the gun. He stares at Michael. _Do it_ he screams inside his mind. _Do it now_! But he can’t. His hand feels disconnected from his brain. He can’t make himself pull the trigger. Michael is right. He’s weak, disgusting.

He drops the gun. “I never want to see you again.”

Michael smiles. “You’ll get over it. This is where you belong, son. Who else would have you?”

Jace turns on his heel and leaves, slamming the door behind him. Daryl is loitering on the stairs.

“What -” he starts to ask, and Jace punches him full in the face without stopping. Daryl hits the ground. “What the fuck!” Daryl yells after him, but he’s already at the top of the stairs, in the bar, back out in the night air. He gets in the truck and drives. He doesn’t know where he’s going, doesn’t care. He just drives blindly, winding through the streets. He drives until his eyes are blurry with tears and he has to pull over onto the side of the road.

He slams his hand into the steering wheel, accomplishing nothing but a shrill blast from the horn and a soreness in his palm. Fuck. There’s nowhere to go. He can’t go back to Michael’s house. He won’t. He feels disgusted - by Michael, by himself, by Lyle. By the entirety of this time in Nashville. He hates his father so profoundly it nauseates him. And he hates himself for thinking he could have this, that he could have Michael back, have a dad. But mostly he hates himself - God, he hates himself - for not pulling that fucking trigger.

Slowly, feeling like he exists somewhere outside his body, he pulls out his phone. It’s past 2AM. Jace stares at the screen for a second and then dials Alec.

He’s about to hang up when Alec answers, his voice heavy with sleep. “Jace?”

“Hi,” Jace says. His voice cracks.

“Jace.” Alec sounds wide awake now, and Jace can almost hear him sitting up in bed. “I’m so sorry. What I said, I was horrible -”

“It’s okay,” Jace says, exhausted beyond belief.

“What’s wrong? Are you alright?”

“Um,” Jace feels tears pricking at his eyes, the back of his throat burning. “No.”  

“Where are you? I’ll come get you,” Alec says at once. “I’ll come right now.”

And Jace opens his mouth to answer but he can’t form the words. Instead, to his horror, he starts to cry.

“Jace, what? What happened!?” Alec pleads.

But Jace can’t speak. He just continues crying, giant wracking sobs that shake his shoulders. He cries harder than he can remember crying since he was a child. And Alec stays on the phone with him. “I’m so sorry. I’m right here, J,” he says, soothing and steady.

Finally, Jace starts to slow down, catching his breath. He feels wrung out, beaten. Alec’s voice never falters. “I know. It’s okay. I’m here.” Jace thinks he hears tears in Alec’s voice too.

“I’m sorry,” Jace says. “I’m so sorry.”

“Come home, Jace.”

“I can’t,” he says, leaning his forehead against the steering wheel.

“Yes, you can.”

“You don’t know. What he’s done. What I’ve done.” Jace is barely speaking above a whisper, afraid to say it out loud. Afraid to acknowledge what he’s learned and thereby make it real.

“Then tell me,” Alec says, as if it were that simple.

“I can’t.” He takes a ragged breath. “Al, I hate him. I hate him so much.”

“I’m sorry. But I promise. You can come home.” Alec isn’t begging anymore. His voice is harder, resolved. Jace desperately wants to give in to that voice.

Jace shakes his head, trying to make Alec understand. “I don’t deserve to,” he whispers, his voice cracking. Headlights flash past, blinding him.

“Yes, you do,” Alec says, sounding so sure. “I don’t care what happened. I don’t care what you did. Come home, Jace. Come back to me.”

Something breaks inside of Jace. “Okay,” he says. “Okay.”

“Are you in Nashville?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll book you a flight right now.”

“Your car - “

“Leave it. We’ll deal with it later. All you have to do right now is get to the airport, okay? Can you do that?”

Jace nods, rubbing his eyes.

“I’m getting my computer now, okay? Are you at your dad’s house?”

“No. Side of the road. I won’t go back there,” he says fiercely.

“Okay. Do you have your wallet?”

“Yeah.”

“That’s all you need. Leave everything else, okay? We’ll deal with it later.”

“Alec,” Jace says, his voice raw. “Alec -”

“Mh?” Alec says, slightly distracted. Jace can tell he’s already pulled up flight options and is scanning his computer as they speak, trying to figure out how to get him home as fast as possible.

“Thank you,” Jace breathes.

“ _God_ , Jace. Of course.” He’s silent for a moment, and then; “Okay. You’re on the first flight out of Nashville. 6:10AM. Can you just go to the airport now and wait?”

Jace nods again, then remembers he’s on the phone. “Yeah.”

“I’ll be there to meet you.”

“Al -” Jace says, overwhelmed. He doesn’t know what to say, but Alec seems to sense that.

“I know,” Alec says. “I know.”

“I’m gonna hang up so I can navigate to the airport.”

“Okay. Text me when you’re there? I emailed you your boarding pass.”

“Okay.”

“I’ll see you soon. Just hold on, okay? Just promise me you’ll hold on.”

“Promise.”

***

Jace spends the duration of the 104 minute flight staring out the window and resolutely not thinking about anything. It had been pretty effective. But now they were disembarking and knowing that Alec would be here, that Alec was close to him, was doing something strange to the pit of his stomach. He just had to get to Alec.

Jace had driven Lyle’s truck back to the motel and left it in the parking lot, keys in the ignition. Lyle had texted him a few times but he hadn’t opened them. He didn’t want to speak to him. Lyle was just an extension of Michael, the arm through which his father acted. He feels trapped - trapped in his own body, in his own blood, in his own head. He doesn’t want to know what he knows, but now he does and he feels like an immutable line has been drawn through his life - Before Knowing and After Knowing. It had split him into two. He felt a sort of ruthless condescending hatred towards the Jace who had existed in Before Knowing, as if it was his own fault that he had lived, had been happy, had been blissfully uninformed.

And then he sees Alec, hovering anxiously near the baggage terminal, scanning the crowd for him. Jace is struck by how pale Alec looks, gaunt almost. But then Alec sees him and a smile breaks out over his face like the fucking sun.  Jace closes the distance between them and Alec hugs him like he is trying to fill a hole inside of him. Jace hugs him right back, burying his head in Alec’s collarbone, his nose pressed against Alec’s skin. Alec has his hand at the back of Jace’s neck and he’s gripping him tightly, holding him, and Jace is safe. Jace breaths him in.

“Hi,” he says finally, voice muffled.

“Hi,” Alec says, breaking the hug off abruptly and taking a step away from Jace. “Let’s go home.” Jace nods and follows him out to the car.

He climbs in the front seat, staring at his hands in his lap. “Please don’t ask me any questions,” Jace says.

“Okay,” Alec agrees. He turns on the radio and pulls away from the curb, and true to his word, they drive home in silence.

When they arrive at the estate, Jace stares up at it through the window.

“Weird to be back?” Alec asks.

Jace shakes his head. “You have no idea.”

Alec pulls up in the driveway and hops out of the car. Jace opens the passenger side door, but hesitates.

“What is it?” Alec says, coming around to his side of the car.

“Um -” Jace starts, not sure how to ask what he needs to know.

“No one else is home,” Alec says, reading the question on Jace’s face. “Maybe Rosie, I’m not sure, but not Mother or Father. Izzy’s in New York.”

“Thanks,” Jace nods. “I’m just not ready-” he starts, but Alec smiles at him and he knows Alec understands.

And then they’re back in Jace’s room, and the intensity of the homecoming finally overwhelms him. He takes a deep breath, inhaling the familiar scent. Alec hangs back a bit, uncertain.

“Feels like I was gone forever,” Jace says, collapsing face down on the bed. God, he missed his bed.

“Yeah,” Alec agrees, and Jace feels a pang of guilt.

Without lifting his face from the pillow, Jace kicks off his sneakers and worms out of his leather jacket. Alec pulls the discarded jacket off of him, and Jace would bet anything he owned that Alec had gone to the closet to hang it up for him.

“Come here,” he says to Alec.

Alec obeys, coming to sit on the other side of the bed. Jace turns over onto his side, looking up at him. He wants to thank him but he knows Alec will shrug it off, so instead Jace just reaches out towards him, his arm not quite long enough to make contact. He paws at the air between them. Alec smiles, but there’s something terribly sad about it. He closes the distance, allowing Jace’s outstretched hand to fall on his cheek. Slowly, without pulling away from Jace’s touch, Alec lies down opposite him. Jace stares into his eyes. Neither of them breathe for a moment.

“I’m sorry,” Jace finally whispers.

“For what?”

“I should have been here,” he says. They’re speaking in hushed voices, even though there’s no reason for it. But with both of them laying there looking at each other, the bed feels transformed. It’s a confessional, the space consecrated and holy. Jace’s hand is still on Alec’s face.

Alec shakes his head. “You’re here now.”

Jace is surprised to feel the heavy pull of sleep clawing at him. He doesn’t want to look directly at it, scared he’ll frighten it away.

“Will you tell me what happened?” Alec breathes.

Jace’s eyelids are heavy. He nods. “Not now.”

“No, no,” Alec says, still softly. “When you’re ready.”

“What time is it?” Jace asks.

“After 9.”

He turns his head a little, and asks softly, “Will you stay with me? Please.”

Alec nods. “I already called in sick.”

“Thank you,” Jace says, his hand finally slipping from Alec’s cheek as he rolls over onto his stomach; truly, deeply, and for the first time in weeks, asleep.

 

**Alec, 20**

It was the most exquisite form of torture Alec had ever endured. Laying there next to Jace, close enough to feel his breath, Jace’s hand touching his face. Jace’s mouth, whispering to him. Jace’s body, come home to him.

Alec watches him sleep for a few hours. He’s almost scared to take his eyes off Jace. Scared he’ll blink and Jace will be gone. Orpheus had pulled Eurydice from the underworld only to lose her again, for good this time, with one careless glance. Alec wasn’t going to let that happen to Jace.

He desperately wonders what had happened last night, what had been bad enough to make Jace flee like that. It must have been truly terrible, to drive him back to the Lightwoods despite what they had done to him. His heart is pounding. Poor Jace, betrayed at every turn. And hadn’t Alec committed to worst betrayal of all? Lusting after him? Loving him in way no brother should? He had violated their bond, turned it into something perverse and craven. Jace must never know, he was confident in that. What he wasn’t confident about was how he was going to survive now that _he_ knew how he felt. Since the night he had dreamed of Jace it had been all he could do to keep those thoughts at bay, and that was with Jace 670 miles away. It had been intolerable to live without Jace, but now he’s terrified he won’t be able to live with him.

Mired down in these thoughts, Alec drifts off too.

He wakes when the afternoon light is filtering through the window. He’s disoriented, unsure why he’s in Jace’s room, sleeping in his clothes. And then he sees Jace’s sleeping form next to him on the bed and his stomach drops out. He checks his phone; it’s 3PM and he’s got about 187 emails. Quickly, Alec darts through the passageway back to his room and grabs his laptop, then hurries back to Jace. He doesn’t want Jace to wake alone. 

Alec sits cross-legged on the bed, answering work emails. Raj had been overly formal and distant with him since that night at the bar. That was fine with Alec. He’d rather that than Raj’s cloying familiarity, his insinuations and advances. He didn’t know Alec. No one really did.

Finally it’s evening, and Alec knows he has to get ready for the dinner party he’s attending with Father and Mother and Lydia at the home of the RNC Chairman. Building a relationship with these people was key for cementing Father’s presidential bid. He desperately wants to stay here with Jace instead, but he knows Father would go fully nuclear if he backed out now. Determined not to leave Jace alone for longer than necessary, Alec gets a suit from his room and dresses in Jace’s. He can’t believe Jace is still asleep. It’s going on nine hours now, which is potentially the longest he’s ever seen Jace sleep uninterrupted. He’s just debating if he’s going to wake Jace before he leaves when Jace stirs, looking around the room in a daze until his eyes find Alec.

Jace swallows roughly, his voice heavy with sleep. “Where you goin’, all dressed up?”

Alec sits down on the bed. “Dinner party. I’m sorry. I’ll be right back.”

“Is it night time?”

“Yeah,” Alec smiles. “I have to be in DC at 7.”

Jace rolls over to his back. “Motherfuck,” he says, rubbing his eyes.

“I know,” Alec agrees.

Jace suddenly props himself up on his elbows, an intense look in his eyes. “Alec - “

“What?”

“Are you okay?” Jace demands, wide awake now.

“Yes?” Alec isn’t following.

“I mean are you okay to go to this party.”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Are you going with your girlfriend?” Jace says deliberately.

“I don’t have time to get into this right now,” Alec says, an uncomfortable prickling in his chest.

“Well. We need to talk about it eventually.”

“There’s really nothing to talk about,” Alec says. Why couldn’t Jace just let it alone? The day had felt magical, stolen out of time. Just the two of them, Jace’s mattress delineating the edges of their world. No one else had crept in and spoiled it, but now Jace was raising the specter of Lydia, of Magnus, of everything that had happened this summer.

“Go to the party. We’ll talk tomorrow.” Jace says. Alec opens his mouth to argue, but before he can say anything Jace continues. “Yeah yeah, I heard you, there’s nothing to talk about. We’re gonna talk anyway.” He sighs heavily. “Did you tell your parents I’m here?”

“Not yet. I wasn’t sure how you wanted - or if you wanted.”

“Thank you. I’ll handle it.”

“Let me know if you need help,” Alec says, and Jace smiles at him and Alec thinks that that smile could make him forgive just about anything. “Will you...will you be here when I come home?” Alec asks tentatively.

“Yeah,” Jace nods. “I’m not going anywhere.” 

***

Alec valets the Range Rover and follows Lydia up to their hosts’ penthouse. His parents are already there, and he kisses his mother on the cheek, shaking hands formally with this father. It feels strange not to mention that their prodigal son has returned, but he’ll leave it to Jace. And he suspects that if he so much as implied there was a hint of family conflict in front of Chairman McCartney, Father’s head might explode.

Alec assumes what is starting to feel like his default position; a glass of wine in one hand, the other resting on Lydia’s back while he makes innocuous small talk with various important people. They’re talking to Jim French, who as Lydia had unnecessarily reminded him, is the general counsel of the RNC.

“By the way, I’ve been meaning to have a word with your father, young lady,” French says to Lydia.

“Oh? What about?” she says, her permanently affixed wide smile in place.

“What does he think he’s doing with this sanctuary city nonsense? It really doesn’t help our agenda if we’ve got Republican mayors subverting our own legislation at every turn.”

“Ah, well. That one you’ll have to take up with him directly. I’m proud to support my father’s efforts on this wholeheartedly. It’s becoming increasingly illogical for the Republican party to try and maintain this hard line anti-immigration stance.”

Mr. French shakes his head at what he clearly feels is a youthful display of idealism. “Alec, what do you think? Do you support this lark of Miss Branwell’s?”

Alec takes a large sip of wine to buy himself some time. “I think the Republican party only functions as a unified front. Attempts to undermine that are always going to be problematic, of course.”

French nods in support, clapping Alec on the back. “Listen to your boyfriend, my dear. He’s got his head on straight. Excuse me a moment.”

He departs, and Lydia turns on Alec, rolling her eyes. “You’re so full of shit,” she whispers to him.

“Excuse me?” Alec says.

“You could have backed me up! ‘The Republican party only functions as a unified front,’ give me a break. You’re not even a Republican.”

“Yeah well I’m not exactly going to announce that to this crowd, am I? And I am a registered Republican, thank you very much.”

Lydia rolls her eyes. “Classic.”

“What does that mean?” They’re both whispering, still smiling at each other so as not to tip the others off. They’re well trained.

“Grow a spine,” Lydia mutters.

“Seriously,” Alec says, “I’m not listening to a lecture on integrity from _you_.”

“I’m very upfront about my political beliefs,” Lydia snaps. “I don’t pretend to be someone else to advance my dad’s agenda.”

“You’re. Pretending. To. Date. Me,” Alec hisses through clenched teeth.

“For _me_ ,” Lydia says. “Not for him.”

“Whatever helps you sleep at night, sweetheart,” Alec says, wondering if anyone in the room would notice if he stood up on a chair and started screaming.

“I think we need to have this conversation at a later date,” Lydia says calmly, putting her hand on Alec’s arm. He shrugs her off. “Hey. Careful,” she says, an edge in her voice as she glances around the room.

“I need to get some air.” Alec pushes past her, stopping only to refill his wine glass as he steps out onto the balcony. Thankfully no one else is out there. It’s too hot still, and the air-conditioned living room of McCartney’s home is far preferable.

Alec drains his wine glass in one long sip. Jesus Christ. Drinking hard liquor in front of this crowd would earn him a firm look of disapproval from Father, but it’s going to take him about 18 years to get enough wine in his system to endure this dinner party. Fortunately he’s come prepared, his trusty flask waiting comfortingly in his pocket. He takes it out and is relieved to feel the burn of whiskey in his throat. He knows he’s been drinking too much, but what else is he supposed to do? He just has to survive the summer, he thinks. And then he and Jace will go back to school and he can leave Lydia behind. _And then what?_ Move back into the apartment he shares in Boston with Jace? Spend their senior year trying to silence the voice in his head that screamed for him to reach out and touch Jace? He wants to rip it out, tear it from the roots, this cancerous thing that grows inside of him. He imagines a team of doctors slicing his chest open and pulling out the rotting mass that sits on his heart.

He can hear Lydia’s tinkling laugh from inside. Who the fuck does Lydia think she is, lecturing him about being genuine. Of _course_ Alec thinks the Republican party is full of shit, but it’s not like he’s got a lot of options. Members of a prominent political family didn’t suddenly jump ship and abandon the party. And they certainly didn’t suddenly announce they were gay. Nor did they pursue sexual relationships with their family members. He was pretty sure the Democratic Party actually frowned on that as well, come to think of it. He laughs humorlessly to himself, takes one more drink from the flask, and then rejoins the war. 

***

All throughout the dinner, Alec has had the lurking sensation of disaster on the horizon. He knows he’s the timebomb and hates the way Lydia keeps casting sidelong glances at him out of the corner of her eye. He’s drunk, obviously, but certainly holding it together. He’s gotten quite good at maintaining a level of functional drunkenness this summer. He can include that in the post-internship write up for his Harvard advisor.

The dessert plates are being cleared, and the end of the night is in sight - _he can go home, home to Jace_ \-  when McCartney suggests the men have a cigar in the library. At Father’s curt nod Alec rises as well, although he can’t think of anything less appealing.

He accepts his cigar politely, leaning against a desk while the older men arrange themselves on various armchairs.

“So, young Mr. Lightwood,” Chairman McCartney starts. Alec tries to pull himself together upon having been addressed directly. “Do we hear wedding bells for you and Lydia?”

“Well it’s quite early for all that, Mr. McCartney. But yes, it’s going very well, thank you.” Alec says with a fake smile to rival Lydia’s.

“I’m glad you were able to settle down after that spot of trouble,” Senator Gilbert says. Alec glances at Robert and sees his face tighten.

“Thank you,” Alec says neutrally.

“You know how teenagers can be,” Robert says. “Always getting themselves mixed up in something they don’t mean to. It’s an impressionable age.”

McCartney murmurs in agreement. Alec rather resents being referred to as an impressionable teenager at age 20, but anything to deflect the conversation away from him and his personal life, he supposes.

But now French picks up the thread. “It’s nice to see such a lovely young couple like you and Lydia out representing us. And I heard you’ll both be pursuing law degrees after college?” He smiles. “Be careful or you’re going to become the face of the party’s future.”

“That’s very kind, thank you, sir.” The cigar is making Alec feel slightly nauseous. He had picked at his food over dinner and apparently a liquid diet didn’t quite mix with cigars.

“But what about that brother of yours?” French asks. “What does he plan to do after graduation?”

“Um,” Alec looks to Robert for instruction.

“Jace has actually moved in with some biological family members we were previously unaware of. He’s no longer living with us,” Robert looks at McCartney. “Should everything move forward next year, it would only be my real children, Alec and Isabelle, appearing at press events.”

French and McCartney both nod, as if they’d been given some long-awaited reassuring news. Alec recoils. How dare Robert write Jace off like that? As if he hadn’t been his son for almost ten years. Robert shoots a warning look at Alec, but Alec feels reckless, his blood thundering in his veins.

“Actually, Jace came home this morning,” he says, looking directly at his father.

“What?” Robert says, stunned.

“I guess he didn’t get the memo that you were trying to get rid of him. Thought he was still welcome in his own home. But if you’re planning to ship him back to his meth-addict dad…”

McCartney makes a little noise of distress at the word “meth”. Robert looks panicked.

“No, of course not. We’ll discuss this tonight, as a family,” Robert says, clearly trying to smooth things over. “Now, Jim, I’ve been meaning to ask you - “.

But Alec isn’t done. “You know, I’ve spent my entire life trying to be good enough for you. All of us have. But it doesn’t matter. We all failed you anyway.”

The room goes very still. Robert opens his mouth, but Alec doesn’t give him the chance to speak.

“Jace failed you by not being your own blood. Izzy failed you by being a girl. And me -”

“Alexander,” Robert’s voice is past warning now.

“Well. It’s no secret here, is it?” Alec asks, skin burning. “They all know what I am. Why I disgust you.”

“I think perhaps we should leave you gentleman alone,” McCartney starts, moving noncommittally towards the door.

“No need,” Alec says. “I’m going.” He starts to leave, but stops with his hand on the door, looking back at his father. “I would have tolerated just about anything from you. I _have_. But not this. Not when it comes to Jace.”

Before the door has even shut behind him, he can hear Father going into damage control mode, trying to reassure the men, dismiss Alec’s raving. Fuck him. Fuck all of this. He was getting out of here. He storms into the dining room, where the women still sit chatting. Lydia jumps up and goes to him.

“Alec, what - “ she puts her hand on his arm, but he yanks it away. She stares at him, dumbstruck.

“Alec,” Mother starts, also rising from her chair.

But Alec doesn’t stop to talk to them. He has nothing to say. He takes the stairs even though they’re on the top floor, takes them at a run until he’s dizzy and blood is thundering in his ears. He grabs his keys back from the doorman before he can stop him and gets into the Range Rover.

He’s speeding home, speeding back to Jace. He wants to get Jace and run away, far away from here. From Robert and Maryse and Lydia and the RNC and politics. He fumbles in his pocket and takes out the now almost empty flask, draining it.

The weight of what he’s done is finally sinking in as he reaches the edges of the city. Father would never forgive him. He would be cast out. He flashes again to this morning, laying in bed with Jace. The heat of his body, the scent of his breath. And Jace’s hand on his face. The tips of Jace’s fingers tracing his skin. They could run away together. He reaches for his phone, abandoned on the passenger seat. He’s going to call Jace. He’s going to tell him. He’s going to ask him to run away with him. Jace would do it. He hates DC too. They could go away together. They would get Izzy and the three of them would run away and start over somewhere. He’s still searching in the passenger seat for his phone, but he can’t find. It must have slipped off onto the car floor. He just has to find it, and then he can call Jace and Jace can say yes. Jace would go with him, he knows he would. He leans over, and finally his hand closes around the phone.

 

**Jace, 20**

Jace can’t hold his breath any longer. He kicks off from the bottom of the swimming pool and shoots to the surface. He takes a deep gulp of the night air and immediately submerges himself again, pushing down until he’s sitting on the bottom of the pool, looking up at the moon.

He closes his eyes and sees Michael, standing behind his desk. Jace pointing the gun at him. He had him. Right there. No one was going to stop him. He could have done it. And he hadn’t. He was too much of a fucking coward to pull the trigger. Michael was right. He was weak, repulsive. What kind of man would let someone like Michael live? He plays it over in his head again, but this time he pulls the trigger. This time the bullet goes straight through Michael’s brain, blood fanning out on the wall behind him. This time he gets what he fucking deserves.

Jace floats to the surface, and as he gets closer to the top he hears a distant, muffled tinny sound. He breaks through the water; his phone is ringing. Leaning over the side of the pool, he wipes his hands dry and answers it.

“Hey Iz,” he says. He realizes she doesn’t know he’s come home, that he’s with Alec again, that he’s going to stay and help him, help her.

It’s silent on the other end of the phone. “Hello? Izzy?”

And then Jace realizes she’s crying, her breath wracked with quiet little sobs. “It’s okay, Izzy. I’m here, I’ve seen Alec. I came home this morning. I’m gonna help,” he says, thinking she must still be worried about him.

“You’re home?” she says.

“Yeah. I came back this morning. Everything’s okay.”

“No,” Izzy says, her voice heavy. “No, it’s not.”

***

Jace sits in the back of an Uber staring at his phone, determinedly watching the little dot inch along the blue line. He mentally traces the route, urging his dot to move more quickly, as if he could somehow force the car through traffic, force it to arrive at Union Memorial Hospital.  He feels unnaturally calm. He can see with almost freakish clarity exactly how the past hour has played out. Izzy told him everything she knew while she waited for their helicopter in New York. At approximately 9:45PM, Alec had driven directly into oncoming traffic on the 185 North highway. Onlookers reported that he had swerved at the last moment, flipping his car into the embankment on the south side of the highway. Paramedics arrived minutes later and had to cut him from the vehicle, which was destroyed. They did not yet know the extent of his injuries. He was currently unresponsive. The paramedics told the Lightwoods his blood alcohol level was three times the legal limit.

Maryse and Robert had called Izzy and sent the helicopter to get her. Izzy claimed Maryse had instructed her to call Jace, which Jace doubted. But that was okay. He felt absolutely nothing beyond a dull pounding in his head and a vague desire to throw up. Alec was currently unresponsive. Currently unresponsive. Unresponsive. It felt like such a diminishment. Unresponsive. Like he just wasn’t answering his phone. Like Jace hadn’t answered his phone, hadn’t come when Alec needed him. Now Alec was here. Now Alec was unresponsive. The blue dot has barely moved. Jace closes his eyes, but then he sees Alec’s Range Rover flipping over, imagines Alec’s body crumpling. He opens his eyes.

He wonders if Izzy told Maryse and Robert he was coming to the hospital. No one but Alec had known he was even in Maryland. _You should have been here_ , he screams silently at himself. _You should have been here. Should have been here should have been here should have should have should have been here_.

Finally he arrives at Union Memorial. But now that he’s here he feels like he can’t actually move, like in those dreams where you’re trying to run but your legs won’t work properly. The woman at the front desk tells him there’s no one checked in under the name Lightwood. Of course. They wouldn’t have used the Senator’s name. Jace considers just making a fucking break for it and running to the elevators, searching the halls until he finds Alec, but there’s a security guard at the desk eyeing him suspiciously. There’s nothing for it. He calls Maryse.

“Jace,” she answers. Her voice is hardened.

“I’m at the hospital,” he says, unsure of himself. What if they didn’t want him to come up? What if they were angry at him for disappearing? For how he’d spoken to Maryse the night he left?

“I’ll call the front desk and tell them to let you up. We’re on the ninth floor,” she says without hesitation.

Jace exhales, but he’s still far from anything like relief. “How is he?”

She swallows. “We’ll see you in a minute.”

Maryse is waiting for him when the elevator doors open. Jace looks at her for a moment, and then Maryse opens her arms and Jace closes the distance between them and hugs the only mother he’s ever known. Everything else between them will still be there tomorrow. Right now, it’s only Alec. Maryse holds him tightly, but he breaks away. He needs to see Alec.

“Can I - “ he starts.

Maryse nods. She looks like she’s aged ten years “He’s going to live. But -”

Jace feels like he just missed a step going downstairs. He hadn’t even allowed himself to put into words the thought that Alec wouldn’t live. There was simply no alternative. There was no back up plan for existing without Alec. “But _what_?”

“He’s in a coma right now. It’s medically induced,” she says quickly, which is apparently supposed to be reassuring to him. “Just until they can assess the extent of the head trauma,” Maryse says all this with a clinical detachment that scares Jace more than hysteria would have.

“Head trauma,” Jace repeats dumbly.

Maryse purses her lips. “Yes. That’s the biggest concern right now. He also had a collapsed lung, but that’s relatively minor.”

Jace nods as Maryse pulls open a door. “They’ve closed this wing for us.”

Jace nods, and she stops in front of a room. “You can go in. They can’t run any more tests until swelling goes down around the skull fracture.”

“Thank you,” he says staring at the door numbly.

“Jace,” Maryse starts. She reaches out a hand tentatively, touching his shoulder. “I’m - We’re sorry. Your father -”

“Later,” Jace says. He opens the door.

Alec looks both better and worse than he expected. His head is bandaged and the rest of him is badly banged up, but he’s whole. He’s in one piece. It’s the hospital gown, the sterile bedding, the wires on his chest and tubes in his mouth and nose that make bile rise up in Jace’s throat. This isn’t right. This isn’t Alec. Not his Alec.

He hears someone clear their throat, and finally Jace tears his eyes away from Alec. Robert has stood up from his chair by the bed. He extends his hand to Jace, as if they were going to shake over Alec’s comatose body. Jace nods curtly. He can’t look at Robert right now. It was Robert who taught Alec to hate himself.

“Robert, dear, why don’t we give Jace a moment alone,” Maryse says from the doorway. Robert looks like he profoundly dislikes this idea, his jaw working tightly. But then he nods and follows Maryse out, closing the door behind him. Jace drops into the chair Robert had just vacated.

He stares at Alec’s unmoving body. Now that they’re gone, he doesn’t actually really want to be alone with him. Because it’s not him. It’s Alec’s body, but the extent to which it seems vacated is making Jace feels panicky and sick. “Come back,” he mutters to Alec. “I came back for you. Now come back for me.” He’s suddenly livid with Alec for driving when he was that drunk, for letting himself get to this point, for thinking this was the way to get back to Robert. “Come back you fucking asshole,” he mutters.

 _The coma’s induced,_ he tries to remind himself. _They can pull him out of it._ But Jace knew enough guys who had gotten head injuries from MMA and shit to know that if they’d taken the risk of inducing a coma, things were bad. What if Alec came back but he wasn’t _Alec_ anymore? Jace thinks of this morning, laying next to Alec in bed. The warmth of his cheek, his breath on Jace’s skin. Alec standing guard over him while he slept. Something in his chest is too tight. He forces himself to breathe. “Don’t do this to me,” he mutters to Alec’s unhearing form. “Please don’t do this to me.”

He looks at Alec, eyes closed, one of his high cheekbones split by a long cut. _I’ll do anything_ he thinks, not sure who he’s bartering with. _I’ll do anything. Just let him be okay, please_. He thinks of all those hours spent in church with the Lightwoods, praying to a God he didn’t believe in. But Alec believed. Maybe that was enough. So he prays. _I don’t know all the words, not like he would_ , he thinks. _But please. Whatever you gotta do. Get him through this. He’s the only good thing I have left._ Alec _was_ so good, so kind and intelligent. He wanted to change the world, to help people. It was intolerably cruel that Alec was laying here, possibly dying, while Jace lived. Why was he left untouched? Why had he lived when his mother, his sister - not even a year old - had died? What kind of God would keep taking the people he loved but leave him alive? He, who brought absolutely nothing of value to the world. Who had abandoned the single most important person in his life when Alec had needed him most? Was that the God Alec believed in? _Just pull him through this_ , Jace thinks, _then we’ll talk_. _Keep him safe. I’ll do anything._

***

It’s somewhere after 5AM when the doctor announces that they can begin the next round of tests. Izzy, who arrived around 2AM via helicopter, has fallen asleep with her head in Jace’s lap, and she sleeps through the conversation. Robert had run home to change, so it was just the three of them. Maryse nods, asking questions and pressing the doctor as he explains what procedures they needed to run. Jace can’t process all the medical jargon. He just keeps stroking Izzy’s hair, listening to the gentle rise and fall of the doctor’s clipped British accent.

Robert returns and Maryse goes home to change as well. Jace refuses to leave.

Izzy wakes after a few fitful hours of sleep and glances around the hospital room, confused. It breaks his heart to watch her remember, to see her face crumple. He updates her quickly. Robert types on his Blackberry. Izzy suggests they go get coffee from the cafeteria, slipping her hand into Jace’s as they walk to the elevator. He squeezes her hand. They wait for the elevators. Maryse returns. Time passes. It feels like he’s watching a movie. A series of events progress, but they have nothing to do with him. He’s not in his body anymore.

At 10AM, a full twelve hours after Alec turned the world upside down, the doctor tells them that there is no evidence of brain damage. Alec was going to be fine. They could wake him from the coma. Izzy bursts into tears, turning into Jace’s chest. He holds her tightly, wrapping his arms around her waist. The doctor is still talking to Maryse and Robert, explaining the timeline for healing a skull fracture, the need to monitor internal bleeding, the potential for future complications, but Jace isn’t listening. Alec was going to be fine. Alec was going to be fine. Alec was going to be fine.

Only Maryse and Robert are allowed to be in the room when they pull him out, so they suggest Izzy and Jace go home and rest. Alec will be disoriented for a few hours anyway, and they have some blood tests to run still, but they promise he can see Alec that evening.

Jace doesn’t think he’ll be able to sleep, but he agrees to take Izzy home. He’ll shower, get something to eat. In the car, Izzy takes his hand again and rolls up the partition.

“You came home,” she says softly.

They hadn’t talked about it at all as they kept vigil through the night. He nods. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left like that. I wish I never had.”

“I understand why you thought you had to,” she says, which is such a deeply Izzy-esque thing to say that it overwhelms him for a moment and he can’t answer.

“I was stupid.”

“You were,” she agrees. “But you came back.”

Jace nods, and the full weight of Michael’s revelation washes over him again. It wasn’t that he had forgotten; he thinks that, for the rest of his life, there will never be a moment where he is truly able to forget. It was just that he had been so consumed with worry that there hadn’t been room for it.

Izzy searches his face, concerned. “What is it?”

Jace shakes his head, but there’s a part of him that actually _wants_ to tell Izzy. He can’t keep it inside of him anymore. The secret, so long buried, so incomprehensible in its cruelty, couldn’t live with him alone. It was too big. He looks at Izzy’s face, exhausted and pale but unflinching. Hadn’t she, and Alec too, proven themselves a thousand times over by now? They could handle this. They would have handled Michael, and the drugs, and Lyle, and Nashville, if he had let them. He just never gave them the chance. He takes a breath.

“I came back yesterday,” Jace says, although that sounds impossible now. It had been the longest two nights of his life. “Because I learned something.”

“About your dad?” Izzy asks, still holding his hand.

“Mhm.” He doesn’t have a clue how he’s supposed to say this, so he just spits it out. “My mom and my sister didn’t die in a car accident. Michael killed them both. He murdered them.” He says this all flatly, like he’s reading a weather report.

Something dark flashes across Izzy’s face. She bites her lip, and Jace can tell she’s trying to get control of herself before speaking. “Jesus Christ,” she exhales.

“Yeah,” Jace say lamely.

Slowly, Izzy unbuckles her seatbelt and slides across the back seat towards him. She says nothing, just wraps her arms around him and pulls his head to her shoulder. They sit like that in silence for a few minutes.

“I don’t know what to do,” he confesses into his sister’s neck.

“Is there anything _to_ do?” she asks. “Like, legally?”

“I don’t know. It was sixteen years ago.”

“There’s no statute of limitations on murder,” Izzy says, which is such a profoundly Alec-esque thing to say that he almost does start crying this time. “But I’m not sure...do you know...know how?”

“He shot them.”

“Oh,” Izzy says so softly he almost doesn’t hear her. “Oh, Jace. I am so, so sorry.”

“I shouldn’t be alive,” he whispers into her shoulder, vocalizing for the first time the sentiment that had been building in his brain since Michael told him. “I wish I wasn’t.”

Izzy doesn’t respond for a moment. “But you are,” she says finally. “And you’re the reason I’m alive. Alec too. You changed our lives, saved us in ways you don’t even know.”

“That’s not true,” Jace says pulling away from her.

Izzy puts her hand to his cheek, but he can’t meet her eyes. “I promise you, Jace. You’re the best thing that ever happened to us. And I won’t let you believe you’re anything other than that.”

They don’t speak for the rest of the way home, riding in silence while Izzy rests her head on Jace’s shoulder. For the first time since he left that motel, Jace can breathe properly.  

Izzy goes to her room to nap, but Jace doesn’t think he’ll be able to. He takes a shower, keeping his phone on the sink in case Maryse or Robert calls. But there’s no word for them, so Jace figures he might as well try to lay down. He sits on his bed, running his hand over the pillow where Alec had slept just yesterday. Slowly, he lowers his head to the pillow, burying his face in it and drinking in Alec’s smell. Struck by an idea, he climbs off the bed and through the passage into Alec’s room. Alec’s bed is still unmade, and Jace assumes it’s been that way since he was pulled from it in the middle of the night by Jace’s phone call. He slips into the silk sheets.

He’s surprised when he wakes up a few hours later to find that Izzy has had the same idea. She’s curled up next to him in Alec’s bed, fast asleep, her face tilted upward. She looks so much like Alec, with her dark eyebrows and elegant features. He puts an arm over her, trying to understand the sense of relief coursing through him. She had come for the same reason as him, and upon finding him here had joined him rather than return to her room. She’d fallen asleep next to him, made herself vulnerable and unguarded. So she still felt safe with him. Despite knowing what his father had done. Despite knowing he had a murderer’s blood, monster blood, running through his veins. She wasn’t afraid of him.

Keeping one arm over Iz, he checks his phone and sees that he has a text from Maryse, which must have been what woke him. Alec is awake and doing well. They could come back and see him.

He rubs Izzy’s shoulder. “Iz,” he says softly. “Wake up.” She stirs with great effort. Poor thing. She must have been dead asleep.

“How’s Al?” she asks sleepily.

“Good. We can go back.”

“Great.” She rubs her eyes, blinking up at him. Yawning, she asks; “Remember the year I slept in here with you guys like, every night?”

“Yeah,” Jace smiles. His arm is still thrown over her and he pulls her in for a hug. “After you watched _Nightmare on Elm Street_ with your friends and decided you were scared of your bed.”

“In my defense, I was twelve,” she says, hugging him back.

He lets her go and climbs to his feet. “Let’s go back. I wanna see him,” he says, stretching. But Izzy is still laying on the bed, looking at him thoughtfully. “What’s up?” he asks.

“You know, I think you’ve spent so much of your life learning how to fight that you don’t even see it anymore.”

“See what?”

“How good you are at protecting people. It goes both ways, you know, the physical strength, the skills you have.” Jace laughs a little, trying to dodge the compliment. “I mean it,” Izzy continues. “People want to be strong for lots of reasons, Jace. Some people get strong so they can hurt others. But you’ve always cared about being strong because it allowed you to protect other people.”

Jace rubs his hand over his eyes. “That’s not why I started boxing, though. Your dad just didn’t want me to get in fights at school. It wasn’t a - a noble thing, or something.”

“I don’t think it matters why you started. It’s just who you are.”

He doesn’t know what to say. “Thank you.”

Izzy stands up. “You’re not like him. You’ll never be like him.” She kisses him lightly on the cheek, and then says, “I’m going to get my shoes. I’ll meet you downstairs.”

Jace watches her go, tears pricking at his eyes.

***

As soon as Jace steps into Alec’s room in the hospital and sees him propped up in bed, still full of tubes but chatting with Maryse, he’s filled with two equally strong desires. The first is to run to him and hold him tightly. The second is to scream at him. He manages to restrain himself from doing either, hesitating for a moment in the doorway.

But then Izzy pushes past him into the room, takes one look at Alec, bursts into tears, yells “you fucking idiot,” (Maryse: “ _Isabelle_!”), and then throws her arms around him. Jace feels a wave of envy, wishing he could be as transparent with his feelings for Alec as Izzy was.

“Hi little sister,” Alec says. His voice is oddly hoarse. He pats Izzy on the back with one hand, but his eyes are locked on Jace. They stare at each other from across the room, not saying anything. But they don’t need to. Alec nods slightly over Izzy’s shoulder, and Jace nods back.

“How are you feeling?” Izzy asks, sitting back on the bed.

“Not bad. They gave me a lot of painkillers,” Alec says, his voice still hoarse. Jace realizes it’s probably from the tubes they had shoved down his throat.

“When do you get to come home?” she continues.

“Not for awhile,” says Maryse. “They need to monitor the cerebral contusions while the skull fracture heals.”

“Where’s Robert?” Jace asks, crossing his arms in the doorway. He sees Maryse and Alec exchange the quickest of glances. Ah. So there had been an argument already.

“He went to work,” Maryse replies. Jace is still looking at Alec, but Alec ducks his head now, not making eye contact. Jace’s palms twitch. He’ll speak to Robert later. “Jace,” Maryse continues, “come down to the cafeteria with me. I need to get something to eat.”

Jace nods quickly, stepping back out into the hall. He’s confused by his reaction to being in this room with Alec. When they were at home, all he had wanted was to get back. But now that they’re here, Jace finds he’s having a hard time looking directly at Alec. It was making him feel weird and antsy, like he needed to go run a few miles or hit something for awhile. He follows Maryse down to the lobby, but instead of continuing straight to the cafeteria, she puts an arm around his shoulders and steers him outside. “Will you take a walk with me?”

“Of course,” Jace says, suddenly anxious. Now that Alec was out of the woods, it made sense that he would be hearing about his behavior. He braces himself.

They stroll in silence for a few moments through the hospital’s small garden. Finally Maryse says, “So you found Michael.”

“Yes,” Jace says, holding his breath.

“Was he what you wanted him to be?” she asks neutrally.

Jace laughs flatly. “I hated him.”

Maryse smiles a little. “Yes. So do I. But still, we owe you an apology. It wasn’t fair to keep him from you. We should have told you he was alive, given you the option of having a relationship with him. But can I confess a mother’s weakness?” Jace nods at her to go on. “I didn’t want to lose you to him. I love you, Jace, I’ve loved you since the day you were born. And you are the only piece of Celine I have left. I didn’t want Michael to get his hands on you. I was selfish.”

“I get it.” And, with a lump rising in his throat, Jace realizes he has to tell her. He owes it to her. “Maryse, when I was there - I learned.” Somehow this is so much worse than telling Izzy. “I - he told me…”

“He told you what really happened to Celine and Clarissa?” Maryse says, stopping on the path and turning to him.

“You know?” he says, shocked.

“No. But we always suspected…”

Jace feels tired, but it’s a tiredness in his bones. He’s exhausted by the neverending layers of secrets and lies. “You never told me.”

Maryse looks at him, her eyes shining. “How do you tell a child that, Jace?”

“I’m not a child anymore.”

“I know that. And I had thought, I will tell him when he’s 18. But then 18 came and went. And you were happy. I justified it - what right did I have to shatter your world? But mostly I was too much of a coward,” Jace bites his lip as she goes on. “Besides, I never knew for sure. We weren’t able to find him for many years. But he behaved like a guilty man, and I never believed the car accident story.”

Jace nods. “Tell me what you do know. I think I can fill in the rest.”

Maryse starts walking again, and Jace follows. “Celine was my best friend. We had known each other since we were ten or so. Much like you and Alec. In our last year at Columbia, she met a boy in the city one night. He was a street kid, scrappy and cool. I thought she was just having fun with him and eventually would move on. She was like me, from a wealthy family, a completely different world. But he had her under a sort of spell.”

“My father has that affect,” Jace says bitterly.

“He can, yes. He’s also a very talented chameleon. He can contort himself into whatever he thinks you’ll like. So he made himself Celine’s whole world. She withdrew from me, little by little. I urged her to break things off with him, and he convinced her I was trying to control her, that I was jealous and manipulative.”

Jace nods. He’s not having trouble envisioning this. “What was my mother like? Before him.”

“She was the kindest person I knew. She loved her friends fiercely, and was too clever for her own good. She had a laugh that lit up an entire room.” Maryse stops. “I should have told you all this long ago. I should have kept her memory alive, for all of our sakes. But I was heartbroken. And it was easier never to speak of her. I’m sorry.”

“Keep going,” Jace says.

“After you were born, she pulled away more. They moved to Brooklyn. I held you a few times. I don’t know if you ever knew that.” Jace shakes his head. “But Michael hated when she saw me, and eventually I guess she stopped thinking the fights were worth it. By the time she got pregnant with Clarissa, we spoke maybe once a year. Your grandparents tried to get her to come home. They begged her, cut her off, everything they could think of. But she was in too deep with Michael. I never met your sister, but still, I kept tabs on them.”

Jace nods. He knows what’s coming, anticipating this part of the story with a sick sense of dread.

“And then one day, they were gone. I had been trying to get in touch with her, I was worried about her being in that house with a baby. The last time we had spoken she had sounded scared of Michael. Although maybe I just heard what I wanted to hear.” Maryse stops, taking a heavy breath. “She stopped answering my calls. I hired a private investigator, and eventually he tracked down Michael. He had moved away, changed his last name. I don’t know if you ever knew that. Your real last name was Herondale. He changed it to Wayland shortly after their deaths. I assume to hide from me, and from what he had done.”

 _Herondale_. The word sounds so foreign. He had never even heard his own last name before. Everything he had ever known about Michael was a lie. The shape of his world had crumbled around him.

“The investigator found him in Kentucky. No trace of Celine, or Clarissa. Or you. We thought all three of you were dead.”

“He used to leave me,” Jace says slowly. “For months. When we lived in Kentucky. He would leave me with this girlfriend of his.”

Maryse nods. “That makes sense. As I told you, we thought you had died too. I would have adopted you on the spot if I had known you lived. The investigator couldn’t find any trace of Celine. She was last seen alive entering her apartment in Brooklyn, carrying her baby. Michael had told people in town, where he was living in Kentucky, that his wife died in a car accident.”

Jace shakes his head. “He killed her. He told me. He shot her and Clarissa. He was on meth. He couldn’t handle hearing his own baby cry.”

Maryse puts her hand over her mouth for a moment.

“I’m sorry,” Jace says.

Maryse nods. “Me too.”

“And I’m sorry, from him, too. I’m sorry my father took her away.”

“No,” Maryse says, her voice suddenly hard. “No, I won’t accept that from you. You don’t have to atone for his sins.”

Jace looks away, ashamed. Maryse puts her hand to his chin and straightens his face. “I mean it. I won’t let you find a way to blame yourself.”

Jace doesn’t know what to say. Maryse continues. “And then I imagine you can figure out the rest. Robert had friends in the police department who knew the name Michael Wayland, and kept an ear out for it. They alerted us as soon as they heard about the fire. And they told us a little boy had survived. We took you home that day.”

Jace feels older than he ever has in his life. He rubs his eyes.

“I hope you will forgive us one day,” Maryse says simply.

“I do,” Jace says, surprised as he says it by how much he actually does. He had thought forgiving them was unimaginable. But he’s ready to lay down his arms. “I do forgive you for this. But not for what you’ve done to Alec. Never for that.”

“No,” Maryse says, slowly. “I don’t suppose I’ll ever forgive myself for that either.” 

 

**Alec, 20**

Alec spends three days in the hospital floating through life, buoyed by painkillers and his 18-hour a day mandated sleep schedule. At least, he thinks it’s three days. Time passes in strange lurches; sometimes he watches the seconds hand creep around the clock and sometimes he wakes from marathon sleep sessions to discover hours and hours have passed. Apparently he needs that much sleep so the parts of his brain that slammed against his cracked skull will heal. It’s strange to imagine your own brain bleeding. It’s strange to think that he could, and by all accounts _should_ , be dead. Had the fracture been a bit deeper, his nose broken slightly more to the right, the paramedics taken a few minutes longer, his father unable to afford the best doctors in the country; any one of those was enough to have killed him.

But here he was. God knows why. He’s felt nauseous since he woke up, which one of the nurses told him was a normal side effect of the painkillers pumping through his veins. He believes her, but he doesn’t think that’s the cause of it. No, he suspects it’s the way every single person he cares about in the world has looked at him since he woke up here that’s making him feel sick. The knowledge of what he had put them through is almost unbearable. He wakes one night (or perhaps it’s day, it’s hard to tell the difference anymore) and for once no one else is in the room. He’s all alone. He seized the opportunity and let himself cry, for what he had done to himself and for what he had done to his family and for what he still wants but will never have.

When he had first woken up, the gentle British doctor had explained that he’d been in an accident, and then placed in a coma for his own safety. He told him all of this in a slow, soothing voice, as if he expected Alec to panic. But Alec didn’t feel panicked; he felt only a vague sense of displeasure at being alive. And then the doctor left him alone with his parents. Mother hugged him, tears in her eyes, but the Senator had been stoic.

“I’m sorry,” Alec had told him. “I’m really, really sorry.” He had nothing else to say in his defense, could only repeat that inadequate word in a plea for absolution.

“For this? Or for what you did at McCartney's?”

“Robert,” Mother had said.

“You disgraced our family,” he continued.

“I know,” Alec replied miserably.  

“This is going to be hard to come back from. But not impossible.” The Senator had already slipped into campaign mode, trying to find an angle he could sell this from. “I’ll need you to go into a treatment program, make some sort of public apology for your recklessness. You’ll need community service hours. Maybe a high school speaking tour about the dangers of drunk driving. And of course this will resurrect the gay rumors -”.

“Get out,” Mother had said.

“Excuse me?”

“We almost lost our son today. Do you have no shame?”

Alec had been stunned. She’d stood up, putting herself between Robert and Alec.

“Go,” she said to him. “We’ll talk about this later. Let me be with my child in peace.”

The Senator had been so stunned he’d obeyed without complaint. Looking back at it now, Alec was certain it was the first time he’d ever seen his mother stand up to Robert. It was possibly the first time he’d seen _anyone_ stand up to Robert. He’d been back since then of course, but now he spoke to Alec with a sort of stiff politeness, like they were acquaintances. Alec finds he prefers it that way. He can’t imagine what Mother must have threatened him with, but he never mentions politics once, nor does he comment on Jace’s return.

On what he thinks is the third evening, they start to wean him from the painkillers. He can feel them receding from his system, because slowly everything starts to hurt. He’s sore and his head is throbbing which stresses him out but the doctor says it’s fine and it wasn’t good for him to get stressed. It’s one of the rare times where he’s completely alone in the room. Mother, Izzy, and Jace seem to have worked out some sort of rotation so there’s always at least one of them in the room with him. He’s tried to dismiss it as paranoia, but he’s fairly certain that Jace has been avoiding being alone with him. He’s woken up a few times to find just Jace there, sure, but each time Jace has made an excuse to leave fairly quickly. Otherwise he’s almost always there with Izzy, the two of them curled up together on the couch, whispering or looking at something on one of their phones. It makes him oddly anxious, and somehow more lonely than when they’re not here at all. Alec doesn’t know Jace’s reason for avoiding him, but his idle brain has plenty of time to think of possibilities. Jace hates him for being so reckless. Jace hates the Lightwoods for lying about Michael. Jace hates him in general. Jace found out about Alec’s feelings and now hates him. There were a lot of options.

But then Izzy knocks as she cracks the door, leaning into the room. “Hey, how’re you feeling?”

“Ugh,” Alec says, his bones aching.

Izzy raises her eyebrows. “That good?”

“They pulled my Vicodin.”

“Tough break,” she says unsympathetically. “You up for a visitor?”

“Only if you promise not to talk so loud,” he says, patting the bed next to him.

“No, not me.” She pulls the door open all the way, and Alec feels his stomach drop. Lydia is standing behind her. “I’ll leave you two alone,” she says. Lydia hugs her quickly, and Alec shakes his head desperately at Izzy while Lydia’s back is to him. Izzy smirks at him and leaves, pulling the door shut behind her.

“Hi,” Lydia says, approaching the bed with deference. “Are you sure it’s okay for me to come in?”

“Of course.” Alec says. “You’re my girlfriend, you probably should have come to see me sooner.”

“No,” Lydia says. “No, I’m not.”

“What? Because of the accident?” Alec asks. “I know it’s not good press, I’m sorry -”

“Jesus Alec, I don’t care about the press. Maybe you haven’t noticed, but this stupid relationship is making you miserable.” She hovers at the foot of his bed, not sitting down.

Alec sighs. “I’m sorry. I can do better. It’s not you.”

“I know that,” Lydia says, confident as ever. “Listen, the whole reason we did this was because we thought it would be good for both of us. And this is clearly not good for you. Believe it or not, I actually really care about you. So I’m calling it off. You can tell people you dumped me, whatever you want.”

Alec stares at her, shocked. “Seriously?”

“I mean, if you’d rather tell people I dumped you, that’s fine too,” she says with a little shrug.

“No, I just - I’d said I would do this.” A part of Alec feels terrible that he’s let her down, but it’s significantly outweighed by the profound sense of relief coursing through him.

“Yeah, well. Now I’m saying I won’t. So. Looks like you’re out of a girlfriend,” Lydia says, flipping her braid over her shoulder.

Alec smiles weakly at her. “I really am sorry. I know I haven’t been easy.”

“I’m not so easy myself,” she smiles back. “I’m glad you’re going to be okay.”

Alec looks away, self-conscious. She really was a much kinder person than he gave her credit for.

“You decide how you want us to have broken up,” Alec says. “You’ve earned break-up dibs.”

Lydia laughs. “Okay. I’ll text you.” She turns to go, then stops. “Can I give you some advice? As your ex-girlfriend?”

“Of course,” Alec smiles.  

She looks at him, her eyes kind. “Tell Magnus you’re in love with him.”

“Magnus?” Alec repeats, surprised.

Lydia stares at him, comprehension dawning on her face. “Oh. I didn’t realize...well. Whoever it is you’re in love with. I think you should tell him.”

And then she leaves.

Early the next morning (probably), Alec wakes with a start, heart pounding. He looks around, disoriented, trying to place himself. His eyes find Izzy and Jace, both asleep on the couch, and he immediately feels calmer. He tries to remember the dream that woke him. The flash of headlights. The accident. Of course. He’d been dreaming of the accident.

He shifts uncomfortably in bed. Everything is bruised. He briefly considers asking for more Vicodin, but he knows they won’t give it to him. Anyway, he did this to himself. He ought to bear the consequences. For about the millionth time, he forces himself to think how lucky he was that no one else was injured. He’d flipped his car into the embankment, and the two cars in the southbound lane had hit each other when they slammed on the breaks, but both drivers had been fine. There was a little girl in the back of one of the cars. She was fine too. Alec forces himself to imagine how he would feel lying here if that little girl had died. He feels sick. Why did the doctors even bother to pull him from the coma? It was better for him in here. Safer. Where he couldn’t hurt anyone. Couldn’t continue spreading the chaos that had followed him all summer. Since he had met Magnus. That’s what had set this whole thing in motion. _But that was your fault too_ , he reminds himself. _You could have ruined Magnus’s life by outing him_. And of course he had hurt Jace. And Lydia. And Izzy, who’d only ever tried to help him. God, he was stupid. He couldn’t stand it.

Even with the two of them, the people he loved most, in the room, Alec feels utterly alone. He doesn’t know how he’s supposed to go on this way, with Jace here in front of him, living and breathing and being _Jace_. How long could he restrain himself, how long before he slipped up and revealed how depraved his feelings were. Maybe in another life, things were different. In another life, Jace wasn’t his brother. In another life, Alec wasn’t such a fuck-up. In another life, Jace wanted him too. But not in this life. Not here. Here, Alec is alone. And he always will be.

He can’t stand it anymore, so he stirs loudly, trying to wake Jace and Izzy. Neither of them move, so he tries again, sighing intensely in their direction. Jace shoots up, awake and ready. He was never that deeply asleep, and Alec remembers his old joke that Jace was like a horse, always sleeping on his feet.

“Hey,” Jace says, his voice throaty with sleep. He elbows Izzy.

“Owwwfuckwhat,” she says in one breath.

“Sorry,” Alec lies. “Didn’t mean to wake you.”

“S’okay,” Izzy says. She sits up, disentangling herself from Jace. She looks at Jace’s mussed hair and laughs a little, combing it out with her fingers while Jace shakes his head like a dog.

“I’m starving,” Alec says, suddenly irritated at the pair of them.

Jace checks his phone. “I don’t think you get breakfast for a few more hours. I’ll go pick something up for you.” He stands up quickly, pocketing his phone and grabbing his shoes.

“No, you don’t have to go,” Alec says quickly.

“No problem. I’ll be right back.” He’s already halfway out the door. “Coffee, Iz?”

“Duh,” she says, going to join Alec on the hospital bed. Jace pulls the door shut behind him.

“He didn’t even ask me what I wanted,” Alec says, sullen.

Izzy rolls her eyes, patting Alec on the shins condescendingly. “Sorry, princess. Wanna call him and place your order?” Alec burrows deeper down into his pillow. Now that Jace is gone, he regrets waking them. “Oh c’mon.” Izzy says. “What’s with you?”

“What’s with me?” Alec repeats heatedly, sitting up so he can glare at her properly. “I dunno Izzy, maybe it’s that I haven’t left this stupid room in a week? Or that I literally broke my skull? Or, oh, here’s another option, maybe I’m upset because apparently Jace can’t stand to be around me anymore.”

“You _fractured_ your skull,” Izzy corrects, sighing. “But I know. I’ve noticed. About Jace, I mean.”

“Is...is he mad at me?” Alec asks, hating how small his voice sounds.

“I don’t know. He’s been having a really hard time, Al. You’re not the only one with shit going on.”

Alec hangs his head. “I know that. He still hasn’t told me what happened in Nashville.” Izzy makes a face. “Wait. Do you know?” Alec says. Izzy nods. It stings that Jace had told Izzy and not him, although there was no reason he shouldn’t have. The two of them had been spending loads of time together watching over his crippled body. Of course it had come up. “So? What was it?” he demands.

“It’s not my story to tell. Ask him yourself.”

“I would, if he’d stay in a room with me for more than 90 seconds.”

“Speaking of talking to Jace,” Izzy says delicately, folding her hands in her lap. “I think it’s time we had a real conversation -”

“Izzy, this better not be going where I think it’s going,” Alec says warningly.  

“I’m just saying. I’m the only other person who knows the reason you were drunk off your ass that night has nothing to do with some stupid RNC dinner, or with Lydia. Or Magnus.”

Alec looks away from her piercing stare. “You don’t know anything,” he says.  

“Don’t talk to me like I’m somebody else,” she snaps.

Alec grabs her hand. “Listen. There’s just...There’s no version of that conversation that ends well. For any of us. You have to see that. Nothing can ever happen. I’ll just have to endure it.”

“Is that how you want to live your life? Just enduring?”  Izzy says softly, their fingers interlaced. “Is this what enduring looks like?”

“I’m not going to put anyone in danger again. I’ll be smarter,” Alec promises.

“I mean. Good. But that’s not what I was asking.”

Alec exhales loudly. “There are no other options, Iz. This is where the road ends. If you can’t change something you just have to learn to live with it.”

Jace opens the door, carrying a plastic bag and a coffee tray. Izzy and Alec both jump, dropping each other’s hands. Jace gives them a look. “Having a private moment?” he says, quirking an eyebrow.

“No,” Alec says. “What’s for breakfast?”

***

They eat the breakfast burritos Jace brought and then Alec dozes off a bit more. When he wakes up, Izzy is gone and Jace is reading something on his phone in the corner. Alec strongly suspects Izzy made a not-so-discreet exit in an effort to force the two of them to have a conversation. Jesus, that girl was a nightmare.

“Hey,” Alec says. “You’re still here.”

Jace looks up from his phone, smiling at Alec. His chest feels warm. “How’re you feeling?” Jace asks.

“Like I want to get the fuck out of this stupid hospital.”

“Sure,” Jace agrees.

Before he can think through the consequences, Alec says, “Listen. Can we talk for a second?”

“Uh,” Jace has stood up, hovering in hesitation.

“Do you have to go?” Alec asks. He hears the pleading in his voice but he can’t help it. He wants to know what happened in Nashville. What secrets Jace is keeping. Of course, he has no intention of revealing any secrets of his own; no amount of scheming from Izzy could force that hand. But still.

“No,” Jace says, his body softening. “No, I can stay.” He comes over and sits at the foot of Alec’s bed. Alec’s heart beats faster.

“I wanted to ask...how you were doing. After Nashville. Whatever happened,” Alec says, half expecting Jace to bolt from the room.

“I’m fine.”

Alec nods. “That’s good.”

It’s quiet for a moment. Alec knows he just has to wait Jace out.

“I can tell you. If you want,” Jace says finally.

“I’d like that.”

Jace nods, looking around the room and drumming his fingers on his leg. “I just don’t really want to get into it.” He always had so much more body than he knew what to do with.

“Okay,” Alec says.

“Actually,” Jace says, suddenly jumping to his feet. “It’s not worth it. Don’t worry about it.” He jams his hands in his pockets.

“Don’t worry about it?” Alec repeats. “What does that mean?”

“I just think you have enough to worry about right now,” Jace says, shifting back and forth. He’s drifting towards the door, Alec realizes. He wants to leave.

Alec is stung. “So you told Izzy but you won’t tell me?” he asks, knowing how childish he sounds.

“Seriously?”

“If you really don’t want to it’s fine,” Alec mutters. He can’t read Jace’s expression.

“Jesus.” Jace exhales a heavy breath. “I found out my dad killed my mom, okay? And my sister. There you go. That’s why I called you. That’s why I came back.”

The bottom of Alec’s stomach drops out. “Oh my god,” he says. “Jace -”. He doesn’t know what to say. It’s all wrong. Jace is agitated, angry at him. But really, what _could_ he say? What could anyone say in the face of that?

Jace seems to make a decision suddenly. He turns around, moving back towards the bed intently. His eyes are blazing.

“Let me ask you a question, now,” Jace says, his voice hot with anger. Alec is immediately on the defensive. Jace gestures around the room, lips drawn in a tight line. “What the fuck is this?”

“Oh, Jace.” Alec says sarcastically, before he can stop himself. “This is a hospital.”

Jace stares at him flatly, but Alec knows the look in his eyes. It’s the look he gets when he’s trying to convince himself he shouldn’t punch someone. Jace closes his eyes for a second, and when he opens them he’s gone cold. Calmly, enunciating every word, Jace says, “Alec, are you trying to die?”

“What?”

“Are you trying to kill yourself?” Jace demands, his voice tight. “Is that the plan?”

“Jace,” Alec starts, swallowing hard. He feels sick.

“I mean it. Is that how you want this to play out? I know you, you always have a plan.”

“ _No_ ,” Alec says emphatically. “Of course not.”

“Then tell me where this ends. Because I don’t understand, and I’m not…”. He exhales through his nose, a strangled sound that could be a laugh or a cry. “I won’t do this without you,” Jace continues. “If you’re going, you better take me with you.” He’s still standing, hands in his pockets. He looks as miserable as Alec feels.

“I’m just…” Alec wants to cry. “I’m just having a hard time right now.” He feels stupid and pathetic, bound to this bed by his own selfish actions.

“Why?” Jace’s voice is rising now. “Because of Robert? Lydia? News fuckin’ flash Alec, you don’t have to put up with any of that shit.”

“It’s not that sim-”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ve heard. But honestly, Al, I can’t see what about this isn’t fucking simple.” Alec looks away, but he can feel Jace staring at him. “What are you not telling me?” Jace says suddenly, his voice low and urgent.

 _God_. This is what he got for keeping secrets from the person who knew him best. He had nowhere to hide when it came to Jace. “Nothing,” Alec says, a beat too late.  

Jace rolls his eyes. “Fine. You know, I’m really sorry that for once your life isn’t _perfect_. But hey. You wanna know what I did last week?” Jace says, conversationally. But his voice is slick with hatred. “I pointed a gun at my father and tried to kill him.”

Alec opens his mouth but no sound comes out.

“Yeah. I didn’t. In case you were wondering. Couldn’t pull the fucking trigger.”

“Jesus. Fuck, Jace.” Alec can’t breath.

“Yeah. Well. I’m just saying, forgive me, but I’m running pretty fucking low on sympathy right now. So, just tell me what the game plan is here. Because I don’t want to play anymore.” Jace’s voice is flat. It’s an ultimatum.

“I’m not playing - ” Alec starts.

“I said _stop it_ , Alec.” He’s never seen Jace like this before. He’s raw, stripped down, a live wire sparking. Alec’s chest is too tight. “We’re going to have a fucking conversation about it. Now.”

Alec takes a deep breath. He doesn’t know where exactly they crossed over, but somehow in the course of this conversation they’ve found completely foreign territory. They’d gone over the edge of the map, and now they were standing here, together at the end of the world. He had been naked in front of Jace countless times, but now he truly _felt_ naked. They were both exposed, standing in the eye of the storm.

Jace doesn’t waste time. “First of all,” he says, sounding suspiciously like Izzy. “What are you going to do about Lydia?”

“We broke up.” Alec says, relieved that this, at least, was a question he had an answer to.

“ _Good_ ,” Jace says. “Because that was -”.

“I know,” Alec says quickly, trying to pacify him.

“Second - what are you going to do about Magnus?”

“Nothing,” Alec says, surprised he can answer truthfully again.

“You’ve been fucking miserable since you stopped seeing him. Izzy told me everything. So go get him back,” Jace says.

“He doesn’t want -”

“We’re not talking about what he wants. This is all about you, bro. So. Yes or no question. Do you want to be with Magnus?”

Alec licks his lips. “No.”

Jace looks surprised. “Then what _do_ you want?”

 _You_ , the voice in his head screams. _Only you_. Alec is afraid to open his mouth, afraid of what might slip out.

“It’s _me_ , dude. What the fuck can you not tell _me_?” Jace says, frustration clear on his face.

Alec just shakes his head.

“Jesus. Fine. Last question. What are you going to do about Robert?”

“I don’t know.”

“But you’re going to do something,” Jace presses. “Or are you going to let him control you your whole life?”

“What is there to do? He’s my father.” His words hang in the air. Alec regrets them the second they’ve left his mouth, but he can’t take it back. Jace looks away from him. “I didn’t mean…” Alec starts, but honestly he doesn’t know what he _did_ mean.

“Is that all we’re meant to be?” Jace asks, quietly. He’s still not looking at Alec. “Our father’s sons?”

“No,” Alec says emphatically.

“Robert always cared so much about blood.” He walks away, towards the window, his back to Alec. “‘Blood will tell’, he said to me once. When I was just a kid. I thought he was right. But then you told me to come home from Nashville and I thought maybe it didn’t have to. Maybe I didn’t have to be my father’s son. I could be your brother, Izzy’s brother. I could be my own man.” He finally turns back around to look at Alec. His face is so sad, his guard completely down for once, and Alec feels an unimaginable urge to jump up, to hold him tightly and promise it was all going to be okay. “So,” Jace continues. “You tell me. Am I right? Or is Robert? Because if it’s blood that matters to you, I’ll just go back to Nashville.”

“Don’t say that,” Alec says. “You know it’s not. I’m not like him.”

“Then prove it. Set yourself free,” Jace says urgently.

Alec lets out a shaky breath. He’s terrified. He doesn’t know what’s happening between them, what he feels or what he wants. But he knows Jace is right. He has to choose himself over his father. He has to choose his own life.

“Okay,” Alec says slowly. “But you have to help me.”

Jace sits down on the bed and grabs Alec’s hand. “Of course I’ll help you.” Jace is squeezing his hand, and there’s a new look in his eyes now, one that feels like hope. “Let’s get away from here. As soon as you’re healthy, we’ll go back to Boston.”

“My internship -” Alec interrupts.

“Just walk away,” Jace says, almost begging. He looks at Alec with a wild sort of fervor. Alec wants to fall into it, wants to let himself drown in those eyes. “Walk away from this place. We’ll finish school and then...and then we can go anywhere. We can do anything. As long as we’re together.”

Alec lets himself fall. “Okay,” he says, almost whispering. “Yes. We’ll do it. Together.”

Slowly, Jace bends towards Alec. For one wild, heart-stopping moment, Alec thinks Jace is going to kiss him. His breath catches in his throat. But then Jace touches his forehead to Alec’s. He’s still holding his hand. If either of them moved their lips would touch.

“ _Fratres in vitam_ , right?” Jace whispers, his mouth close enough to start a war.

Alec comes crashing back into reality. “Yes,” he agrees, heart breaking. “Brothers forever.”

**Jace, 20**

Jace knows they won’t be able to leave until Alec is discharged from the hospital, but he starts packing anyway. He needs to do something tangible to mark that a plan is in place. He’s in Alec’s room, sorting through this closet, trying to remember what Al had brought home for the summer. The guy has way too many clothes, but that might come in handy considering Jace had left a lot of his shit down in Nashville. He knows he essentially vanished into thin air, and part of him feels guilty. Not about abandoning Michael, of course. His only regret when it came to Michael was that he hadn’t been the one to send him to his grave. No, it was Lyle who still pulled at the corner of Jace’s thoughts. It wasn’t that he had particularly liked Lyle, he reasons to himself as he folds some of Alec’s shirts. In fact he had rather disliked him. It was just that he had felt so oddly connected to him. He suspected, with some discomfort, that he was drawn to Lyle because he was a vision of what Jace would have been if he’d actually been raised by Michael. Jace could have easily been the jaded asshole with the Confederate tattoo and the heroin addiction. Jace could have been the one who laughed while he beat up his father’s enemies.

Could he really though? He’d like to think he would have turned out differently, that there was something inside him that was good enough, different enough, that it would have withstood Michael’s grooming. He thinks again of his conversation with Alec in the hospital that morning. Nature versus nurture. He was so sure that Alec didn’t have to be like Robert. But Alec was already inherently good, kind and intelligent and compassionate. Alec was a different matter, because really, deep down, Jace knew that Michael was right about him. He had been brought here by sheer chance, not because he deserved to live among these people. He was a conman’s son; he knew how to act the part and perform well for the Lightwoods and their ilk. He remembered the fear that had always plagued him as a child, the fear of being found out somehow. Unmasked as a fraud at some charity ball or St. Bartholomew’s fundraiser. He could run away from Nashville, from Michael and Lyle and that life, but he could never change the fact that deep down, he was always going to be just another rejected kid, marked from birth by blood and addiction and depravity.

His head is swimming and, defenses down, another memory of Lyle, one that he’d rather not think about, floats to the surface. Him straddling Lyle on the floor of that motel, frozen in confusion. Thinking about Alec. There had been a tugging in his stomach as he lay over him, his head just above Lyle’s shoulder. Jace doesn’t know what that tugging meant. He doesn’t think he wants to. Fortunately, he’s spared from this line of thought by Maryse, who knocks gently on Alec’s open door.

“May I come in?” she asks.

Jace nods. She sits on the only corner of Alec’s bed that’s not taken up by the packing. “Are you going somewhere?” she asks.

“Yes,” Jace says. “Alec and I are leaving. As soon as he’s well enough. We’re going back to Boston early.”

Maryse nods. “To get him away from Robert,” she says, simply.

“Yes,” Jace says, trying to gauge her reaction.

“I think that’s probably wise,” she says, smoothing the bedspread with one palm.

“You do?”

Maryse continues studying the bedspread. “Robert’s not going to get the RNC endorsement. They’re running someone else. One of the other wives tipped me off. Not because of...any of this, of course. But I worry…”

“He’ll blame Alec,” Jace says.

Maryse nods slowly, smiling sadly at Jace. “How did we get here, my dear?”

“I’ll take care of Alec,” Jace says. “But he still cares about Robert’s opinion. I think it’ll be really hard for him -”.

“Oh, don’t worry.” Maryse interrupts. “I’ll take care of Robert. Alec won’t hear a word of blame from him.” Maryse sits up a little straighter, like she’s steeling herself. Jace has absolutely no doubt that she means it.

He goes around the bed and hugs Maryse. She seems surprised, at first, but then she hugs him back. He holds her tightly, letting himself feel, maybe for the first time really, how secure her embrace is.

He finally lets go but stays next to her on the bed. “I don’t think I ever really thanked you,” Jace says.

“Thanked me for what?” Maryse asks.

“For taking me in. Adopting me. I know Robert was against it. I know you fought to have me here. So thank you. Thank you for being Celine’s friend even after she shut you out. Thank you for loving me like your own child.”

Maryse pats his cheek, then kisses him on the forehead as she stands up. She gets very busy smoothing her dress, and Jace strongly suspects there are tears in her eyes. “I’ve got to go speak to Rosie about dinner.” She stops in the doorway. “I’m very proud of you, Jace,” she says, her voice tight.

“I love you, too” Jace responds.

***

Jace had run to the boxing gym mostly for something to do. He’d packed as much as he could in advance last night, and Alec was in a bunch of tests all morning, so there was no point keeping watch over an empty bed. He works the bag for awhile, feeling the pull of muscles he neglected while he was away. As always, he feels calmer here, his mind and body settling down into the rhythm of the combos, thoughts wandering. And, as they so often did, he finds them wandering to Alec.

He knows he was hard on Alec yesterday. But honestly, someone need to smack some sense into that kid. With a start, he realizes that tomorrow is Alec’s 21st birthday. In all the chaos of the past few weeks he’d completely lost track of time. Poor Alec, celebrating his birthday in the hospital. He’d make it up to him in Boston, throw him a proper party. Jace is surprised to find that he’s now actually looking forward to going back to school. He just wants things to settle down, for both of them to get back to normal. No, that wasn’t right. Not normal. He feels like both of them, in some way, have moved irrevocably beyond their old selves this summer. There was no going back. But they could go forward together. Not for the first time since their conversation, Jace tries to puzzle out what Alec could possibly be keeping from him. At the end of their sophomore year, when Alec had begun pulling away from him, going quiet when he thought Jace couldn’t see, he had thought Alec was worried about Jace finding out he was gay. He had tried, with varying degrees of subtlety, to make his position explicitly clear. (Jace: “That kid Simon in our anthro section is really good-looking.” Alec: “What?”, Jace: “Want to go to the demonstration for LGBT rights on campus today? Alec: “What?”). But after Magnus, something was different.

“Jace!”

Jace looks up, pulled from his meandering stream of thoughts. Gamble, his old coach, calls him again. “Jace, come here.”

Gamble’s in the ring, working with a younger girl, maybe 14 or 15. By the way she plants her feet self-consciously, Jace can tell she’s new to this. He jogs over.

“What’s up?” he asks.

“This is Katie, first lesson. My damn hip is acting up - can you finish showing her the ropes?”

Jace shrugs. “Sure.” He’s never taught someone properly before, but he had shown the basics to Alec and Izzy so he figures he can handle it.

“Katie, this is Jace. Best guy I ever trained. Just show her the basic punches.” Gamble hobbles out of the ring, cursing under his breath.

Jace smiles at the kid. “So, first lesson. That’s exciting.”

She smiles back at him nervously. “I’m not very good at it, I think.”

“Nah, but you will be. No one is good in the beginning. What punches have you learned so far?”

He works with Katie, correcting her footwork and encouraging her to relax. It’s surprisingly fun, coaching her through the basics. It reminds him of the lazy summers when he’d worked with Alec and Izzy. He likes knowing how to fix things, how to help.

“I think someone wants to talk to you,” Katie says after half an hour or so, nodding over his shoulder. Jace turns around and is surprised to see Izzy, casually leaning against the wall in a skin-tight dress like she owns the place. Four or five of the guys have also noticed her and are lurking nearby, trying to catch her eye.

“Iz, what’s up?” he calls. “Is Alec okay?”

“Oh, yeah,” she says, waving off his concern. She comes over to the ring. “I need to talk to you though.”

“Now?” Jace says. “Hey,” he calls at the group still watching Izzy. “Elroy, McKinnon, you got something to say to my sister?” The guys all shake their heads and suddenly become very busy getting practice pads on. Jace sighs.

“Oh they’re fine,” Izzy says. “I’d stare at me too.”

Jace laughs, shaking his head. “Can you wait? I’m almost done here.”

“Of course,” she says. She looks at Katie. “Sorry to interrupt. By the way, you have the best teacher. He taught me everything I know.”

Katie grins at her, clearly taken with this cool older girl.  Izzy watches as he helps Katie finish up her lesson and do some stretching. “You gonna come back next week?” Jace asks Katie.

“Definitely.” She leaves, smiling back at Jace.

“Nice work,” Gamble says from his desk. “You ever want a job here, it’s all yours.”

Jace laughs. “I’m not a teacher. But thanks.” He grabs his water bottle then turns to Izzy, who’s adjusting one of the very complicated straps of her dress. “Did you put that on just to come here and fuck with the guys?” he asks, trying to keep the laugh out of his voice.

“Of course I did,” she says with a shrug. “You gotta make your own fun, right?”

Jace shakes his head. “You’re a monster.”

She nods her head at Jace’s shirtless chest. “Look who’s talking.”

“Alright, alright, enough. Tell me what’s going on.”

Izzy is suddenly somber, having been reminded of her mission here. “Can we go for a walk?” she asks.

“Sure.” Jace says, concerned. “Listen, are you sure everything’s okay?” 

She nods, not saying anything, so he grabs a shirt and follows her out onto the street. The sun is setting, and the streets are finally cooling off. They walk in silence for a few minutes, wandering into the emptying suburban side streets. Jace is getting increasingly nervous. It’s not like Izzy to keep quiet for more than about eight seconds. Usually the more upset she was the more dramatic her speeches became, so he’s not sure what to make of this anxious, silent girl beside him.

“I have to tell you something,” she says finally, arms crossed tightly over her chest.

“Okay,” Jace says.

“I don’t know if it’s the right thing to do,” she says, sounding frankly miserable.

“Iz, it’s okay. Whatever it is. Just tell me.” Now he’s getting really nervous. Last time Izzy had announced she had something to tell them she had resurrected Michael Wayland.

“It’s not really my thing to tell,” she says.

“Okay,” Jace says again.

She stops abruptly in the middle of the sidewalk. “You can’t move back into your apartment with Alec. In Boston. He told me you guys were going to leave soon. But you can’t go back.”

“What?” Whatever he was expecting, it certainly wasn’t this. “Why not?”

“It won’t be fair. To Alec, or to you.”

“Why?” Jace says, genuinely baffled.

“Alecsinlovewithyou,” she says in a single breath. Then she starts walking again, very quickly.

“Wait, what?” Jace says, closing the gap between them and grabbing Izzy’s arm. “So? Of course Alec and I love each other, why does that mean we can’t go back to school?”

Izzy stops again, shoulders slumping. They face each other in the middle of the deserted sidewalk.

“No,” Izzy says slowly. “Alec is in love with you. Like, romantically, literally in love with you.”

Jace lets go of her arm. He stares back at her. “Why?” he finally says.

“What do you mean _why_?” Izzy repeats, clearly thrown.

“I mean why would he be in love with me? I’m just...” Jace gestures blankly at himself.

“Jesus Jace, I just told you our brother was literally in love with you and that’s your concern?”

“No. I mean, yeah. But.” Jace exhales. “Huh.”  

“Yeah,” Izzy says. “He’ll never say anything because he thinks it’ll ruin things between you. But I don’t think the two of you living together right now is a good idea. It’ll be too hard for him, and of course you’re entitled to feel however upset about this -”

“Why would I be upset?” Jace asks, suddenly offended.

“I mean. I dunno. The two of you are really close. It’s kind of…” Izzy stares at him, searching for a word. “Weird?”

“It’s not like we’re actually brothers or anything,” Jace says.

“I know that,” Izzy says, like she’s trying to diffuse a hostage crisis.

“I’m just saying. I don’t want him to, like, feel bad about it.”

“Well, how do you feel about it?” Izzy says in that same slow, careful voice.

Jace shrugs. To be honest, he didn’t particularly feel anything about it. He was surprised, sure. And yet. There was something about it that made a cosmic sort of sense. Like the last piece of a puzzle sliding into place, finally allowing him to see the big picture. “He can’t, you know, actually want to be with me, like date me or something, can he?” Jace asks.

“I have no idea,” Izzy says. “I honestly don’t know what he wants. But it’s okay. He understands nothing can ever happen between you two.”

“Yeah, well, he knows how God awful my dating track record is. I’m sure he’s happy to dodge that bullet,” Jace says, going for levity. Izzy apparently doesn’t think it’s funny. She’s staring at him like he’s grown a third head. “That was a joke, Iz,” he clarifies.

“You’re taking this, like, a lot better than I thought you would,” she says.

Jace shrugs. “It’s okay. Like you said. He knows I’m straight, and nothing can happen between us.”

“Right.”

“But I’m going to go back to Boston with him. I have to get him out of here, you know it’s killing him to be here.”

“Yeah, but…” she says, chewing her lip.

“I know. But I’ll just give him space. We’ll have a conversation about it and he’ll get over it. We’ll be fine.”

Izzy nods, looking skeptical. Jace loops his arm through hers, and they start walking back towards the boxing gym.

“Alec is literally gonna murder me for telling you,” Izzy says after a moment.

“I won’t tell him it came from you,” Jace says.

“Are you really just gonna like, ask him about it? Just like that?” Izzy asks.

“I don’t know, Izzy,” Jace says, suddenly tired. The insomnia migraine that’s pained him for the past few weeks thumps away determinedly. Other than when he had slept through the day with Alec, he’s finding sleep as elusive here as it had been in Nashville. “I have to think about it.”

“Okay,” she says. She half smiles. “Do you wish I would stop telling you dramatic shit about your own life?”

“Honestly, yes,” Jace says, laughing a little. “Can’t you try digging into someone else’s life for a change?”

“No promises,” she says, kissing him on the cheek.

“Thanks for telling me,” Jace says.

She nods. “It’s not really my business, but…”

Jace smiles. “You’re involved. Three headed monster, remember?”

Izzy nods. “I just want things to stay the way they are.”

“Right,” Jace says, hugging her goodbye. But he knows it’s too late. Everything’s changed this summer.

He reenters the gym, feeling slightly dazed.

“Yo Wayland, what happened to your sister?” Elroy calls.

“Hey, you wanna go a few rounds?” Jace asks.

“Nah man, I’m just fucking around. I won’t talk about your sister anymore,” Elroy says, backpedaling furiously.

“No, I’m serious. I wanna spar a little.”

Elroy eyes him warily, but nods towards the ring.

They dick around, just sparring for fun. Well. Maybe Elroy is doing it for fun. Jace is doing it so he has something to do with his hands while he tries to comprehend what Izzy just said to him. Maybe she was wrong. Maybe she had misunderstood something Alec said, taken some profession of fraternal affection the wrong way. But Jace knows that’s not right. The revelation is like a kaleidoscope through which he can reexamine the past few months, God, the past year even. Fractured events were sliding into focus, taking on new shape and depth.

He sighs. Trust Alec to make things a million fucking times more complicated than they needed to be. Would this really change things between them? Izzy had seemed so confident that it was the end of Jace and Alec™, the end of an era. But people’s feelings could change right? Alec could get over this. He would meet someone new and fall in love with them and then they would fall back into their proper dynamic. This was just a phase Alec was going through. And besides, he couldn’t exactly blame the guy for getting confused by their relationship. They had always been closer than just brothers or friends. He often felt like they existed outside the standard options for defined relationships, floating somewhere off the map in their own little world. Since they were 14 or so, people had been confused by their relationship, suspicious of it. He remembers all those shithead kids at camp who used to tease Alec. They were too scared of Jace to tease him, but they had teased Alec for seeming gay, for needing Jace to fight his battles, for running to Jace when he was scared. Alec used to take it really hard. Had Alec been harboring feelings for Jace even way back then? Did Jace know him at all?

And then there’s a blinding flash of pain as Elroy lands a straight punch on Jace’s cheekbone. Jace steps back in surprise; he’d been so lost in thought he almost forgot they were sparring.

“Fuck dude, I thought you’d block that! I’m sorry!” Elroy says.

Jace waves him off. “My fault. I wasn’t focused.” He takes off his gloves and prods his cheek. The skin isn’t broken, but it’ll be a nasty bruise. He was more distracted than he’d thought; Elroy was a solid fighter but he never should’ve been able to land a hit like that on Jace, certainly not in a sparring round. “Listen I think I actually need to take off,” Jace says, ducking out of the ring. “Thanks though.”

“Dude, I’m really sorry,” Elroy says, looking slightly terrified. “I thought you were covered so I was going to throw that cross and then…” But Jace isn’t listening anymore. He ducks out of the ring and throws his gloves in his locker, heading for the door. Possibly it’s the way the punch landed that’s making his head spin, but he doesn’t think so. He walks home, taking the long way back. He’s in no particular hurry to get anywhere.

 

**Alec, 19**

“If we’re ever gonna get a divorce, I feel like it’s gonna be right here, right now,” Jace says, rubbing his forehead in exasperation.

“Jace,” Alec says, sighing. “It’s not that hard. That couch will not fit. We have to get the gray one.”

“No, the gray one is ugly. Let’s go to another store.” Jace says stubbornly. Alec sits down on one of the display couches, putting his head in his hands.  

“We’ve been to every furniture store in Boston, J.”

“Let’s go shopping in New York next weekend. New York has to have better couches.”

“I want it on record that for once you are the one being insane about a design choice.”

“Um, is it quote unquote being insane to not want the integrity of our beautiful new apartment marred by a hideous couch? I don’t think so.” Jace says.

“While your use of the word marred is appreciated, your point is moot because that couch is perfectly nice,” Alec says. “Also, how dare you threaten to divorce me.”

“Don’t worry,” a cheery saleswoman says in an aggressively positive voice, popping up behind Alec. “Lots of couples fight while furniture shopping.”

“Oh,” Alec says quickly. “We’re not really -”

“We’re not really fighting,” Jace says quickly, interrupting Alec. “We’re not like other couples, right, babe?”

Alec rolls his eyes at him. This was Jace’s favorite joke. They were regularly mistaken for a couple, and Jace thought it was hilarious to encourage the misconception. Alec did not.

“That’s nice,” the saleswoman says. “I’ve always thought gay couples fought less than straight couples. It’s so sweet.”

Jace, unable to hide his reaction, shoots Alec a look of extreme bemusement. Alec can’t help but laugh.

“Thanks. We’ll take this gray couch, by the way. What are your delivery options?” Alec says.

“We will not,” Jace says.

“Could we get this delivered tomorrow?” Alec asks.

“Should I give you gentleman another moment to discuss?” the saleswoman asks, looking vaguely concerned that her ‘gay couples don’t fight’ theory is about to be tested.

“Yes,” Jace says.

“No,” Alec says. “How much for next day delivery?”

“$100 for next day,” she says, gamely pushing forward.

“Great,” Alec says.

“It’s gonna be ugly,” Jace says, throwing up his hands in resignation.

***

Jace follows him up the stairs to their new apartment. They’d moved in two weeks ago, and were almost done actually filling it with furniture. They’d lived without a kitchen table until yesterday, but it had been kind of fun, like camping. They’d sat on the floor, eating takeout with plastic utensils. It had made sense to get a place of their own; Harvard didn’t guarantee student housing after the first year, and they knew they only wanted to live with each other. Robert had bought them the apartment, as Boston was one of the only cities he didn’t already own property in.

Alec looks up from his phone. “So the couch is getting delivered tomorrow between 9AM and 1PM. I can be here till noon, but then I have ethics. Can you be here just in case it hasn’t come?”

“Yes,” Jace says. “But I’m not happy about it.”

“Give it a week. You’ll be thanking me.”

Suddenly, Jace grabs his arm, pulling him to an abrupt halt. “Oof, what?” Alec demands.

“Uh, did you leave the door open?” Jace says, nodding at their front door. Alec looks up. The door to their apartment is hanging slightly open.

“No. I definitely locked it.” Alec says slowly. He exchanges a look with Jace.

Jace puts his hand protectively on Alec’s chest and steps in front of him. “Let me look,” Jace says quietly.

“Should we call the police?” Alec whispers.

Jace shakes his head. “Stay back,” he says as he pushes the door open. He peers around the corner. Distracted as he is, a corner of Alec’s brain is still able to admire how cool Jace looks. He’s always thought Jace would make a badass action movie star.

Jace slips through the door frame, leaving Alec alone on the stoop. It’s the middle of the afternoon; he genuinely doesn’t think anyone would have broken in, but maybe someone saw some rich kids moving in and figured they were easy targets.

“Oh my _fucking_ God,” he hears Jace exclaim. Alec doesn’t think, just rushes in towards Jace’s voice, focused only on getting to him. Jace is in the living room, his expression a cross between exasperation and amusement. Alec follows his gaze and finds (honestly, how did they not see this coming), Izzy. She’s laying on the floor of the living room with her feet up the wall.

“Brothers!” she yelps gleefully, not moving from the floor.

“Izzy,” groans Jace. “You can’t just break into people’s houses.” 

“First of all, this _barely_ qualifies as breaking and entering. It took me about six seconds to pick the lock.”

“Where did you learn to pick lo-” Alec starts. “You know what. I don’t want to know. Let’s skip it.”

“We’re going to have to get the locks changed,” Jace sighs.

“Good. You can make a set of keys for me so I don’t have to break in again.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be in school? It’s Tuesday.”

“No. I quit.” Izzy says, uninterested. She’s still laying on the floor in an L-shape that frankly looks very uncomfortable.

“You quit high school?” Alec clarifies.

“Yes.”

Jace and Alex exchange a concerned look. They’re both standing over her, arms crossed. Alec is suddenly struck by how comically like tired parents they look, peering down at their toddler mid-tantrum. He’s quite taken with the image. He likes imagining them that way.

“Let’s circle back to that,” Jace suggests. “Can I ask why you’re laying on the floor like that?”

“It’s good for blood circulation,” she says brightly.

“Is it?” Alec says doubtfully.

“And also, because I got you guys a present,” Izzy continues, as if she hadn’t heard him.

“Is the present scuff marks on our nice clean wall?” Jace asks.

“No. Come see.” Izzy says. Alec realizes one of her hands is trailing behind the bookshelf, like she’s hiding something.

“Why does this feel like a trick?” Alec says slowly.

“Yeah, this is for sure a trap,” says Jace.

“No trap. Just come see,” Izzy insists. Jace and Alec look from Izzy back to each other. Jace shrugs in a resigned sort of way and crouches down by their sister. Alec follows suit. At first it seems like there’s nothing there. But then a pair of tiny yellow eyes flick open, and the space between the wall and the bookshelf gives a small meow.

“Oh no,” Jace says.

“Isabelle Sophia Campbell Lightwood,” Alec says. “You did not.” 

“She’s just a _baby_ ,” Izzy says. “She’s so sweet. She’s scared, that’s why she’s hiding. But she’ll get comfortable soon and then you can meet her.”

“Is this cat going to be going back home with you?” Jace asks hopefully.

“No! It’s for you guys!” Izzy says, excited. “It’s my housewarming present.”

Alec sighs. “We can’t take care of a cat, Izzy!”

She waves him off. “Cats take care of themselves. You’ll barely have to do anything. But it’s going to feel so much more homey to have a pet.” She strokes the fur ball behind the bookshelf, cooing softly to it. “They’re going to love you so much, sweetheart. You’re a good baby, aren’t you Leonardo DiCatrio?”

“Oh good Lord,” Jace says, sitting down with a thud. “We’re not calling it that.”

“We’re not calling it anything!” Alec yelps. “Because we’re not keeping it!”

“You can’t give Leo _back_ ,” Izzy says, horrified. “I got her from an adoption fair I passed driving here. She doesn’t have anywhere to go back to!”

“Why is it named Leonardo DiCatrio if it’s a girl cat?” Jace asks.

“Uh, because it’s hilarious,” Izzy says.

“It’s not,” sighs Alec.

“Also _very_ gender-normative of you, Jace. Don’t police your cat’s identity,” Izzy says scoldingly.

“Good point,” Jace agrees.

Alec drops his head in his hands. “ _Not_ a good point, because it’s _not_ our cat, because we are _not_ keeping her!” He looks to Jace, expecting an ally, but sees the way Jace is peering behind the bookshelf with a strange, soft look in his eyes.

“It actually is really easy to take care of a cat,” Jace says, offering his fingers to the small furball for inspection. “They don’t need much.”

“How do you know?” Alec asks accusingly.

“One of my dad’s girlfriends, one we lived with in Kentucky - she had cats. I fucking loved those things.”

Alec takes one look at the tenderness in Jace’s face and searches desperately for the will to say no. “Are we even allowed to have a pet?”

“Father bought the building, didn’t he?” Izzy says, finally dropping her legs to the ground and swiveling around to a sitting position. “Seems like yes.”

“I’ll do everything, Al,” Jace says. “You won’t even know she’s here. But we’ve got to rename her.”

Izzy shakes her head. “Unappreciated in my time, like all the greats.” With a tentative meow, the cat pokes it’s head out from behind the bookshelf. It really is a tiny little thing, all black with enormous yellow dragon eyes. The cat butts its little head against Jace’s hand, and Jace lets out a soft coo. Alec knows he’s sunk. Jace is looking at the cat with naked adoration, whispering sweetly to it. Of course Jace had an affinity for rescued things.

“Fine,” he pretends to grumble. “But I’m not happy about it. And I’m _not_ emptying the litter box.”

Izzy cheers, startling the now nameless little demon. She scurries back behind the bookshelf.

“Whoops,” Izzy whispers. “But yay!”

“You got the couch, now I get a cat,” Jace says, putting a hand on Alec’s shoulder. “Marriage is all about compromise,” he says with a wink.

Alec rolls his eyes. “You’re welcome.”

“You’re _both_ welcome,” Izzy says, clapping her hands. “Now. I think we should go to the pet store and get some supplies.”

“Great idea,” Jace says, popping up.

“No, now Izzy is going to tell us what she’s doing in Boston in the middle of the afternoon on a school day.”

“Oh yes,” Jace says, sitting back down. “That first.”

“Do you guys have anything to eat?” Izzy asks, a perpetual master of deflection. “I’m starved.”

After a fair amount of bickering, it’s decided that Jace and Izzy will go to the pet store while Alec cooks dinner, at which point Izzy will be contractually obligated to address her absence from school.

Once they’ve left, Alec decides he might as well do the thing properly. He puts one of their more expensive bottles of wine in the fridge and flips through a cookbook, settling on a somewhat complicated Italian dish with soft-boiled eggs and sausage and about six ingredients he doesn’t have. So he texts Jace and Izzy and tells them to stop at the store for him. Then he sets their brand new kitchen table, setting out some flowers and candles. It was their inaugural meal at the new table in the new apartment, and it felt appropriate that Izzy had appeared, summoned out of thin air, to help them christen it. He’s not too worried about what drove her from school. Izzy had been getting increasingly restless. She’d always bumped up against the edges of their little world in Bethesda, but now, as she reached the end of high school, she was slamming against them, desperate to break through. Izzy had always vastly preferred being at their New York place, or the London apartment. Alec didn’t love Bethesda obviously, he wasn’t an idiot, but he didn’t mind smaller places, slower paces. His favorite had always been the Bridgehampton house, where they would pass long, lazy days in the sun, sometimes chatting, arguing about a book or movie, or just laying around in amicable silence.

Unbidden, an image flashes in his mind, an old memory from one of those summer days. They had been fifteen, maybe fourteen? He couldn’t remember. But he remembered how it felt. He and Jace had gone down to the water early, excited to spend the whole day at the beach. He had fallen asleep on the sand, the sun beating down on his back so intensely it had felt like sleep was the only possible escape from its oppression. He didn’t know how long he had slept for, but he remembered waking. Jace had gone for a swim and, coming back to find Alec asleep, had knelt down next to him, and placed a gentle, wet hand on his back. Alec woke slowly, drunk on sleep and sun. He had blinked up into the sun, which was partially obscured by Jace’s crouched body. It gave him a godly aura, his skin wet and glistening. The scent of sunscreen and sweat and salt water hung in the air between them.

“Hi,” Jace had whispered. And then he had run his thumb across Alec’s shoulder blade, leaving a trail of cold seawater in its wake.

Alec’s body had responded instantly, against his will. He could feel himself hardening. He pressed himself tighter into the sand, trying to conceal his body’s betrayal. “Hi,” he breathed back, scared to move, to give himself away.

“Let’s go in for lunch,” Jace says. His hand is still on Alec’s back. Alec’s head is swimming, trying to fight through to consciousness.

Alec shakes his head, not totally trusting himself with words. “Not hungry,” he says, putting his head back down, horrified by the throbbing pressure of his own body.

“Okay,” Jace says. He draws his hand across Alec’s back in retreat, and there’s a tightening in his stomach so intense he almost quivers. “You okay?” Jace asks. Alec nods, mentally pleading with Jace to leave. “I’ll bring you some food.”

And then he had gone, running back up to the house for the sake of running, of feeling the sand fly out from under his feet. Alec hadn’t dared to move. For what felt like ages he had lain there, perfectly still, until the moment had subsided and he was left only with the sting of embarrassment and a larger cloud of confusion.

Back in the kitchen, Alec’s knife slips over the tomato he’s dicing. He almost slices his thumb. Why had he thought of that day now? He still felt ashamed of the moment, of the way his body had responded to Jace’s touch. It hadn’t meant anything. He was just a teenager. Teenagers’ bodies were always doing weird things. But, he supposed, it might mean something that he still thought of it all these years later. That he could still feel the way Jace’s thumb had dragged across his skin, his body vulnerable from sleep and sun. It didn’t have to mean anything. But somehow it meant everything.

The door to the apartment bangs open.

“It is _literally_ perfect,” he hears Izzy say heatedly from the other room.

“You’re deranged,” Jace’s voice answers. They’re clearly bickering, and the sound is comforting after the slippery current of his own thoughts. Like reading a familiar book after a nightmare. “Alec!” Jace calls.

Alec smiles. “Why are we yelling?” he calls back, pretending to be annoyed.

Jace and Izzy burst into the kitchen, laden with bags. “Good God,” Alec says, “did you buy the entire pet store?” 

“Jace would’ve if I left him unattended,” Izzy says, beginning to empty the grocery bags. “He was out of control. How’s the baby?”

“Still hiding. But she seems okay.”

“Good. Let her get her bearings,” Izzy says.

“Speaking of the ‘baby’, please try and guess what Izzy is trying to name our cat now.” Jace drops into a chair at the kitchen table.

Alec shakes his head. “No, top shelf,” he says with a nod, directing Izzy as she tries to put away the groceries. He’s struck by how much it suddenly feels like home in here. He turns back to Jace. “I’ll truly never guess.”

“Persephone,” Jace says disdainfully.

Alec laughs. “Are we to interpret our home as the underworld? Because if so, way harsh Iz.”

“That’s what I said,” yelps Jace.

“J, can you strain this pasta? I think it’s done.” Alec asks. Jace hops up obligingly, and the three of them are dancing around the tiny kitchen, laughing as they bump into each other.

“No,” Izzy corrects, “You should call her Persephone because she _used_ to be in the underworld. And now you guys brought her to a new home!”

“But Persephone has to go back to the underworld,” Alec points out, “Every six months. She doesn’t get rescued.”

“Plus doesn’t she like it down there?” Jace says, chuckling. “That’s where her boyfriend’s at.”

“Exactly,” Alec agrees. “That’s the whole point. When she’s in one place she misses the other. She’s torn between the two worlds.”

“Whatever!” Izzy sighs. “Sorry for trying to be cute and symbolic!”

“We’re all for symbolism. Your symbolism is just wrong,” Jace says. Alec laughs and Jace smiles smugly.

“Do you have any wine in this godforsaken house?” Izzy demands.

“What are we, not Lightwoods?” Jace says. “Of course we have wine.”

Alec opens the bottle of wine and pours them each a glass, directing everyone to sit down so he can serve.

“Thanks for cooking,” Jace says.

“Yeah, this looks really good,” Izzy echoes.

Alec smiles. He could get used to this little apartment.

Jace raises his glass. “To our new apartment.”

“To Persephone,” Izzy says.

“No!” Jace and Alec say in unison.

“To Persephone,” Izzy repeats.

The boys laugh and drink to it anyway.

By the time they’ve drunk all the wine and eaten all the food, they’re sleepy and content. But Alec hasn’t forgetting the contract they sketched out with Izzy.

“So let’s hear it,” he says, leaning back in his chair. “What’s going on?”

Izzy picks at a piece of bread on her plate, not meeting his gaze.

“C’mon, Iz,” Jace says softly. “What’s bothering you?”

“Nothing,” she says. “That’s the problem. There’s literally nothing wrong.”

“Okay,” Jace says. “And yet…”

Izzy sighs dramatically. “I broke up with Meliorn. Basically for no reason. I just wasn’t interested anymore.”

“That seems like a good reason to break up,” Alec suggests.

“Also because his name is Meliorn, that’s another good reason,” Jace adds.

“That is his last name, please relax,” Izzy says.

“Ignore Jace,” Alec says, trying to get Izzy to refocus. “So you broke up with James Meliorn III.”

“Yeah. And I don’t _care_ ,” she says. “Do you think I’m like. A sociopath?”

Jace laughs. “You’re definitely not a sociopath. No one who cries as much as you in _Homeward Bound_ could be a sociopath.”

“That movie is DEVASTATING,” Izzy says.

“True,” Alec agrees, thinking he’s finally picking up the thread of what’s going on here. “So you’re upset because you think you should be more upset.”

“Yeah,” Izzy says. “I dunno. I just, like, don’t care about a lot of the stuff I used to care about. And it makes me sad.”

“I think that’s just growing up” Alec says.

“But what if the thing I don’t care about anymore is the only thing I’m supposed to care about?” Izzy says.

“I’m getting confused,” Jace says.

“I don’t want to go into politics!” Izzy says in a burst. “I don’t care! I think they’re bad! I don’t want to!”

“Oh my God, Izzy. You don’t have to be a politician.” Alec says, surprised. He hadn’t thought Izzy ever intended to go into politics. She did all the same circuits as him; Model UN, pre-law classes, student government, but she never seemed particularly enthused by it. Plus, Izzy burned too brightly for politics. She was too stubborn, too passionate.

“But everyone _expects_ \- “

“Fuck ‘em.” Jace says, simply. “Fuck their expectations. Do you, baby.”

“Easy for you to say - “ Izzy starts, then cuts herself off.

“I know. I’m not Robert Lightwood’s son.”

“I didn’t mean it like that. It’s just, everyone in our family does this. It’s the only thing I’m supposed to want. And I don’t want it at all.”

“Have you told our parents this?” Alec asks.

Izzy shakes her head. “Father’s going to be angry.”

Alec nods slowly. “Maybe. But maybe not. Give him a chance. He might surprise you.”

He sees Jace and Izzy exchange a brief look. He doesn’t know what they’re telegraphing to each other, but it’s clearly a judgment on his assessment of Father. Izzy was always too critical of him.

“Either way,” Jace says, “you don’t have to care about politics. Or your boring old boyfriend. You’re young and brilliant and beautiful. The whole fuckin’ world is gonna fall in love with you, no matter what you do.”

Izzy flashes him her brilliant smile. “Thanks, J.”

“Seconded,” Alec says. “Is there something you do feel more passionate about?”

Izzy looks down, suddenly embarrassed. “Don’t laugh.”

“C’mon,” Jace says.

“When have we ever laughed at you?” Alec says.

“Okay, okay. I want to go into fashion,” Izzy says, still staring at her lap. “I love it. I want to have my own line, and everything.” 

“Iz, why would we laugh at that? That’s amazing,” Alec says.

“Yeah, it’s perfect for you.” Jace adds. “You’re the best dressed person I’ve ever met. Other than me, obviously.”

Alec and Izzy both laugh. “Really?” Izzy asks. “You guys think I should do it?”

“Of course we think you should do it.” Jace says.

“Father will say it’s stupid,” Izzy says.

“Maybe,” Jace says. “Doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do it.”

“He won’t think it’s stupid when you’re _Devil Wears Prada_ -ing the whole industry,” Alec says. “Is that an appropriate reference? I really don’t remember what that movie’s about.”

Izzy laughs. “Close enough.” She smiles. “How do you guys always make me feel so much better?”

“We’re your big brothers. It’s in the job description,” Jace says.

“You’re gonna be great parents,” Izzy says, her voice strangely genuine.

“It’s true, we’re cat parents now,” Jace laughs.

“Jesus, I forgot,” Alec says. “You know every time the two of you team up and convince me to do something I end up profoundly regretting it.”

“No you don’t,” Jace says. “You just pretend to regret it because you think you’re the sensible one.”

“You know what we should do now,” Izzy says.

“Oh God,” Alec says, with a strong suspicion where this is headed.

“We need to go out and celebrate!”

“Celebrate what?” Alec demands. “It’s a Tuesday!”

“Fuck yeah we do,” says Jace. “There’s this amazing little bar in Harvard Square we should go to, you’ll love it, Iz.”

Alec sighs.

“We’re celebrating you becoming cat dads!” Izzy says, jumping up. “I have eyeliner in my bag, give me five minutes.” She scurries out of the kitchen.

“I’ll come if you promise never to refer to us as cat dads again,” Alec calls after her, starting to clear the table.

Jace elbows him. “We are cat dads now, though,” he teases.

Alec shakes his head. “I will send that cat back to the shelter, so help me God.”

“You wouldn’t dareeee,” Jace says, tipping back in his chair.

“Do you want to help me clear the table or are you just going to sit there and be irritating?”

“You love meeeee,” Jace says, leaning back further.

Alec rolls his eyes. “Yeah, yeah, whatever helps you sleep at night.”

***

The bar isn’t too crowded, being a Tuesday and all, but they manage to have a good time. They only need each other. They had danced for ages on the dark floor. Alec was self-conscious enough that dancing was never going to come easily to him, but he had fun as long as he was with Jace and Izzy. As in so many things in life, he took his cues from Jace, sneaking furtive looks at him on the dance floor. A few times when he’d glanced at Jace to mimic his movements, Jace had been looking back at him. His stare was intense, unsettling almost. Jace was always intense, but this was something else. He didn’t know what to make of it. Finally he had begged for a break, and they’d retreated to a little table in the back. Jace had gone for more drinks, but that was almost twenty minutes ago.

“But like, honestly,” Izzy is saying, and Alec realizes he must have tuned out her story at some point. “ - who does this bitch think she is? So I’m like, 'Girl, he said no, you need to back the fuck off,' right?”

“What happened to Jace?” Alec interrupts.

Izzy seems completely unfazed at the interruption. “Dunno. He’s been gone for fuckin’ ever though. I need another drink.”

“I’ll go check on him. Stay here,” Alec says, getting to his feet.

He finds Jace quickly enough. He apparently never made it as far as the bar, because he’s leaning against a column in the main room, his head bent low to a girl’s ear. Of course. Alec can only see her back, but he knows she’s just Jace’s type. He feels a rush of irritation. They’d been waiting for him, he could have had least let them know they weren’t getting their drinks anytime soon.

Jace has one hand on her waist, the other cupped around her ear so she can hear him over the pounding music. She laughs exaggeratedly at whatever he’s saying, throwing her head back and shaking out her hair. This was just like Jace, getting distracted by the first pretty thing he saw. Jace lowers his mouth to her neck. Alec knows he’s kissing her, but in the darkened haze of the bar it’s almost vampiric. Like Jace is going to consume her. He can’t stand it. He moves closer and catches Jace’s eye. Jace nods his head at him, then whispers something to the girl, squeezing her hand as he pulls away from her.

“Hey,” Jace says, leaning close to Alec just as he had to the girl, so Alec could hear him.

“Honestly, dude?” Alec says, surprised at the level of irritation in her voice.

“Oh fuck sorry, the drinks! Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Alec says.

“You know how it is with a girl like that. Makes you forget your own last name, ya know?”

“Yeah,” Alec says, thinking, _No_.

“I’m gonna take her home. That cool?”

“Yes?” Alec says, unsure what he’s supposed to say.

“Don’t leave for like, fifteen minutes, okay? Give me time to get her into my room,” Jace says with what it is probably supposed to be a conspiratorial, anticipatory head nod.

“Okay,” Alec says. Jace claps him on the back.

“Thanks, brother.”

And then he’s gone, back to the girl with the long dark hair.

Still irritated with Jace, Alec grabs two drinks from the bar and closes out their tab before heading back to his sister. She looks up from her phone. “Jace?”

“No Jace.” Alec says. “He’s taking some skank home,”

“Don’t call girls skanks!” Izzy says, hitting him.

“Ow, Jesus. Relax. You’d call her a skank too, if you saw her.”

“I wouldn’t,” Izzy says.

“Anyway. We’re not allowed to leave for 15 more minutes.”

Izzy laughs, taking one of the gin and tonics from Alec. “Classic Jace.”

Alec drops into the seat next to her. “It’s kind of rude.”

“Rude to who?” Izzy says, looking baffled.

“You!” Alec says, “You came to visit us, and he’s totally ditching you to fuck some girl.”

“Seriously? I don’t care at all. Good for him, man. You ought to find some skank in here yourself.”

Alec rolls his eyes. “I’m not Jace. Things don’t work that way for me.”

Izzy primly sips through her straw, surveying Alec with a look he doesn’t like one bit. “Are you, you know, seeing anyone here? Anyone you like, or whatever?”

“I’d like to not have this conversation, but thanks.”

“You know. If there’s anything at all you want to tell me. Or anything you’re, you know, working through. You know I’m cool right? You can tell me whatever. I’ll support you no matter what.” Izzy says, speaking carefully.

“Was I supposed to understand that?”

“It’s fine if you don’t want to. I just want to make sure you know I’m here for you. You’re my favorite person on earth, that’ll never change.”

“Okay,” Alec says, knocking back a huge swig of his drink. “As soon as I figure out what that means, I’ll let you know.” He sighs, stabbing at the ice in his drink with the straw. “I was going to give you my bed and crash with Jace, but it looks like you’re stuck sleeping with me.”

“On a scale of 1 - 10, how recently have you washed your sheets?” Izzy says, teasingly. Alec doesn’t answer. He’s wondering if Jace has left yet. Are they kissing in the back of the cab? He can see it, see Jace’s hand grabbing at her waist, her hair, her breasts. “That was a joke,” Izzy says.

“What?” Alec isn’t sure he heard her. “Oh yeah. I know. Recently.”

“However are you two managing to function without a live-in staff?” Izzy says in mock horror.

“It’s a shitload of work, actually,” Alec concedes.

“Welcome to the real world, my brother. We are wildly unprepared for it.”

“Oh my God, and now we have a cat. That’s going to be even more work.”

“Jace’ll do everything,” Izzy says, waving his concerns away with an airy hand.

“I’ll believe that when I see it. He’s sure not going to do anything tonight. He’s too busy getting chlamydia from that girl.”

“Dude, can you relax?” Izzy says. “Why do you care so much?”

“I don’t care,” Alec says passionately, which he knows is the least convincing way of proving disinterest. Truth be told, he doesn’t really know why he _does_ care so much. Jace was a notorious slut, he teased him for it all the time. But it never irritated him the way it did now. He tries to tell himself that it’s because Jace is being rude, blowing off Izzy like that, but he doesn’t really believe his own bullshit. No, what he’s feeling right now seems suspiciously like jealousy. Before he can stop himself, the memory he’d revisited earlier that night flashes back, so intensely visceral he almost catches his breath. The ache of the sun, the smell of the sea, the brush of Jace’s thumb.

“Let’s go home,” he says quickly.

“It hasn’t been fifteen minutes,” Izzy points out.

“I don’t care. It’s my apartment. I’m allowed to go back to it whenever I want.”

Izzy stares at him like she’s going to argue, then just shrugs. “That’s between you and Jace. I’ll call a car.”

When they open the front door, it’s clear Jace and The Skank have been there. Jace’s leather jacket is thrown carelessly across the armchair, and a pair of black heels are abandoned in the foyer. Izzy slips into Alec’s room, and he closes the door behind them. They can hear music playing faintly from Jace’s room. The Beach Boys. “Wouldn’t it be Nice.” For some reason the muffled refrain makes Alec profoundly sad.

“Awwww,” Izzy murmurs softly. “Look!” She’s pointing at the little black furball, curled up asleep against his pillows. “She’s so happy here!”

Alec has absolutely no intention of letting the cat sleep in his bed, but he doesn’t have the energy to fight it tonight. He kicks off his shoes and collapses on top of the bed, tentatively reaching out a finger to pet the cat.

“Just for tonight, okay?” he whispers to it.

“He doesn’t mean that, Persephone,” says Izzy, who’s rifling through Alec’s drawers. She produces a pair of sweatpants and pulls them on, then lays down on the other side of the bed.

“That’s not her name.” Alec says, eyes closed.

“I don’t hear any better ideas,” she points out.

“Go to sleep,” Alec says, turning his back to Izzy and Persephone. Izzy and the cat, he corrects himself.

“Love you, Al,”

“Love you too.” After a moment he adds. “Thanks for the cat.”

Izzy doesn’t answer, but he can feel the smugness radiating from her side of the bed. He closes his eyes tightly. He’s tired and a little drunk; he should be able to fall asleep quickly. But for some reason, he lingers in the twilight for far too long, unable to stop his thoughts from straying to the bedroom next door. To keep his mind from thinking of what they were doing now, what Jace was saying to her. All the while one lyric, stolen out of their moment and lingering in his subconscious, racing around his mind on repeat - _wouldn’t it be nice to live together, in the kind of world where we belong_? 

**Jace, 20**

Jace is holding a baby. He knows, in the way you just know things in dreams, that it’s Clarissa. He’s hiding in a closet in their old apartment, trying to keep the baby quiet, but she’s crying hysterically. The house is on fire. He can feel it, feel the heat of the flames licking at the door. There’s nowhere for them to go. He’d backed them into this dead end and now it was too late. “I’m sorry,” he whispers to the baby. “I’m so sorry, I tried.” She cries louder. He can hear the thundering crack of beams collapsing just on the other side of their door. Someone is screaming. A long, chilling scream that Jace can feel in his bones. His mother. It’s too late for her, she’s already burning. He had tried to save Clarissa, he had really tried, but he couldn’t protect her. He couldn’t protect anyone. The door is starting to burn. There’s smoke in his nose, his eyes, his mouth. The baby cries harder. “I’m sorry,” he chokes. The heat is unbearable and now Jace is ready for the fire to take them, ready for it to be over because he can’t endure it anymore. Can’t endure the panicked cries of the baby. _Just take us. Just end it._ The fire is in the closet now, he can feel the flames licking his skin. He’s losing control of his body. Clarissa is slipping from his arms. He can’t hold her anymore. He’s doing to drop her into the fire. But what does it matter, now? It’s over, it’s over for both of them. The flames are everywhere. _Just end it_.

He wakes with a start.  He’s drenched in sweat, tangled up in his sheets. Fuck. He’s breathing hard, like he just fought six rounds. _It’s okay_ , he tries to tell himself. _It was just a nightmare_. It _was_ a nightmare. But, like all good nightmares, it was also real. Clarissa and Celine had died long before the fire, of course, but the principle of the thing remained the same. _You couldn’t have stopped Michael_ , he tells himself, _you were four_. _What could you have done against a grown man with a gun_? He wonders if Michael would have killed him too, had he been home that night. Probably. So that was twice Jace had lived when he should have died. Once at Michael’s hand, once in the fire. Twice he had survived, for reasons that were completely unknown to him, and completely inexplicable. He knew there was a word for this - survivor’s guilt. But it wasn’t guilt he felt at being alive. It was more like revulsion. Survivor’s revulsion. Or maybe survivor’s incomprehension. Those were both more accurate.

Jace wonders if he’ll ever stop feeling like such a broken thing. He had thought, maybe, he had a chance. Before Nashville, before Michael. But if anything, his Southern sojourn had reminded him just what he was, Lightwood mask or no. He had always felt so much older than his age, older than the other kids he knew. Older than Alec and Izzy, too. He had thought he was mature, but now he thinks he’s just had to live too much life too quickly. No wonder he was always tired. And there was no fixing something like that. You couldn’t turn back the clock.

Jace knows he’s not going to be able to go back to sleep. If Alec were home he would have crept through the passageway to join him in bed. That was the only way he could sleep most nights. He probably can’t do that anymore though, he realizes. It would be confusing, unfair to Alec. But Jace would miss it. He wonders what that says about him. Jace didn’t think he was gay, but he had also never given it any particular thought. It was so clear with Alec, who had never particularly liked girls and generally approached them with a demeanor of slight distrust more appropriate to a bomb diffuser. Jace had always been comfortable in his body; he knew he was attractive, he liked flirting, he liked attention, he liked having sex. He didn’t really think about it beyond that. He remembers, with a flash, the time he had kissed Alec at camp, back when they were kids. Had Alec already had feelings for him? Jace had liked kissing Alec, but he had thought of it as a joke, a school boy dare. But if he had liked that, did that mean Jace was gay too? Could he be?

It didn’t matter, though. Even if Jace could conceive of a world where he would hook up with men, it wouldn’t be Alec. Alec was too important to him. Jace knew (and Izzy liked to remind him) that he was terrible at relationships. He bounced around, casually dating girls, dipping out whenever one of them got too attached. Or they would leave when they realized he was always going to have one foot out the door. It wasn’t that he didn’t like the girls he fucked around with, it was just that...he didn’t know, actually. He wasn’t good at relying on people, he knew that. Every man for himself, that’s how Michael had raised him. He wonders if he’ll ever stop blaming Michael for the way he was. Probably not. He supposes having a father who killed his mother didn’t particularly suggest him as a candidate for Boyfriend of the Year. So he didn’t even try. Honestly, Alec was the only person he had ever truly, fully, let all the way into his life. Izzy too, of course, but really Alec was the only one who knew him, inside and out. That was too important to him. He would rather die than try to live without Alec, and he knows that’s exactly what would happen if they ever did try dating, or hooking up, or whatever they would even call it. Alec would grow tired of his elusiveness. Worse, Alec knew him too well to let him get away with 98% of the shit he usually pulled in relationships. He would call him out and Jace wouldn’t be able to handle it. He’d get mad. The way Michael had always gotten mad. The way Michael had gotten mad at Celine that night.

Why was he even entertaining this line of thought? None of this was happening. He just needed to have a conversation with Alec. He would go see him tomorrow (which was now probably today, based on the dawn light starting to filter in through his window) and they would just acknowledge it. Then they could both move on. They would address this and then leave it in the past. It would be something they joked about in ten years, something Jace could tease him about. It was going to be fine.  

***

When Jace knocks on Alec’s door that evening, it’s a pretty dismal scene. He can tell Izzy, and probably Maryse, have made an effort; there’s flowers and some birthday cards propped up on the windowsill, and Izzy is laying in bed with Al watching _Michael Clayton_ for possibly the 90th time. But still. This was no way to celebrate a 21st birthday.

“Hey Al. Happy Birthday,” Jace says, shutting the door behind him.

Alec looks up, seeming surprised to find Jace there. “Hey. Thanks.”

Izzy pauses the movie and jumps to her feet.

“Are you going?” Alec asks.

“I’ve been here all day,” Izzy reminds him. “I’ll let you boys have some fun.” She kisses Alec on the cheek and then hugs Jace tightly. She holds his gaze for a moment. She looks grateful, but Jace can’t imagine why.

Izzy slips out before he can figure out what she’s trying to tell him. He sits at the foot of Alec’s bed. Alec looks listless.

“Having a good birthday?” Jace asks sarcastically.

“Yeah, the best,” Alec mutters. He’s quiet for a moment. “I didn’t think you were going to come.”

“Why wouldn’t I come? It’s your 21st birthday dude, that doesn’t happen everyday.”

Alec studies his hands. “I don’t know.”

“Well, you’re an idiot,” Jace says bracingly. “Now. Do you wanna stop feeling sorry for yourself and have some actual fun?”

Alec looks around his little room. “How much fun can we have in here?”

Jace rolls his eyes. “Please dude, be slightly more mopey.” He unzips his backpack and tosses a pair of jeans, shoes, and a flannel shirt at Alec.

“Uh,” Alec starts.

“We’re breaking you out of here.” Jace says, smiling. “One night only.”

“I don’t think they’ll let me…” Alec says, a hopeful look crossing his face nonetheless.

“They won’t. Which is why _breaking_ was the operative word.”

Alec stares at him a moment, then grins. He hops out of bed and starts pulling on the clothes Jace brought. “God, it feels good to wear normal clothes again.”

“You were getting too used to being an invalid,” Jace says.

“Where are we going?” Alec asks.

“You’ll see.” Jace grabs two pillows and tucks them into the bed, mimicking a sleeping body.

“Oh my God,” Alec laughs. “That barely worked when we were kids.”

“Once again, emphasis here is on _barely_ ,” Jace says. He pulls a long white coat on over his clothes, and Alec breaks out laughing again. See, Izzy was wrong. Nothing had to change between them. Alec seemed totally normal to him, he was hardly acting like someone in the throes of some illicit crush. He was just Alec.

“There’s no way we’re going to pull this off,” Alec says, still giggling. But he’s tying his shoes. 

“Not with that attitude,” Jace says. “Get in the wheelchair and act sickly.”

Jace wheels Alec out quickly, trying to look stern and medically inclined. When he wheels him past the front desk, Alec barely suppresses a fit of giggles by turning it into a hacking cough, which of course makes Jace laugh. But nobody stops them, and soon they’re outside, the remains of the humid day hanging in the air around them.

He wheels Alec to the car and offers a hand to help him in.

“I can do it,” Alec says stubbornly.

“Okay. But you better tell me if anything hurts. Or if you’re too tired and want to go back,” Jace warns.

“I guarantee I will not want to go back.”

Jace abandons the wheelchair and hurries back to the car, and then they’re on the open road. Alec rolls down the windows and sticks his head out like a dog, whooping with glee as the wind whips through his hair. Jace smiles, realizing how long it’s been since he’s seen Alec’s smile. He missed it.

Finally, Alec pulls his head back in, leaning against the headrest. “Seriously, will you tell me where we’re going now?”

He looks over at Alec, who has his head cocked quizzically in Jace’s direction, his dark eyes intent.

“I’m taking you to church,” Jace says.

Alec laughs, but when Jace doesn’t, Alec realizes he means it. “Really? St. Bartholomew’s?”

“Of course,” Jace says.

“Our hideout?” Alec’s voice is weird.

“Yeah,” Jace says, wondering if this was a bad idea.

After a long moment, Alec says, “Thank you. Seriously.” His voice is still tight.

Jace can feel Alec’s eyes on him. He doesn’t look up from the road. “No problem. You know I love a jailbreak.”

Alec is quiet for a minute, and Jace risks a glance at him. He immediately regrets it. Alec is still looking at him, and there’s a burning intensity in his eyes that Jace doesn’t know what to do with. Alec looks away quickly, and Jace turns back to the road. Was this what Izzy had meant? Would he spend the rest of their lives trying to interpret every expression, every little glance? Why had Izzy even bothered to tell him? There was nothing he could do about it, and now he had to second guess every single thing between them. He knows they need to talk about it, it’s the only way to deal with this. But how do you even start that conversation? _Hey bro, heard you were in love with me, that true?_ Jesus. This was fucking impossible.

“Just don’t fall off the roof and break your head again,” Jace says, trying to lighten the mood.

“God, you break your skull one time and no one ever let’s you live it down,” Alec says jokingly.

While Alec was busy being an altar boy and, you know, believing in God and all, Jace had roamed the church’s expansive grounds, trying to occupy himself. When he was 13, he had figured out that if you were enterprising enough, you could use the cobblestone facade at the back of the building to scale your way to the roof. If you made it across the steep angled shingles to one of the soaring bell towers, you could climb into the little enclave at the tower opening. Presumably it was for maintenance, but no one had ever been up there besides Jace, Alec, and Izzy, as far as he could tell. You could sit with your feet hanging out and see for miles. Jace used to think it was the top of the world. He and Alec had loved sneaking up there. When they were hiding in the bell tower, it felt like they were the only two people alive.

Jace turns into the parking lot of St. Bartholomew's Church. It’s deserted at this hour, shut down for the night. Jace grabs his backpack and climbs out of the car. Alec follows him. “You sure you’re up to make the climb?” Jace asks, realizing it’s possible he didn’t fully think this through. Well, when had he ever thought something through?

“Definitely,” Alec says, his face determined.

“Okay. You first.”

Jace is nervous, but Alec scales the wall like a pro and soon they’re ensconced in their hideout, feet dangling into nothingness. The sun is just setting, and the summer night is warm and still. The light refracts across the the panels of stained glass windows in the cathedral, giving the entire church grounds an ethereal glow. It had always made Jace feel something he assumed was close to spirituality, until he realized that was the whole point of stained glass and felt tricked. He didn’t like being manipulated.

Alec rests his cheek against the bell tower, gazing out at the skyline. “Amazing,” he whispers under his breath, more to himself than to Jace it seems.

Jace watches him drink in the view for a few minutes. After two weeks of staring at white hospital walls, he’s like a lost desert traveler stumbling upon a waterfall. “Listen,” Jace starts, and Alec turns to him. “You gotta cool it with the fucking drinking.”

“I know,” Alec says, looking properly ashamed of himself.

“Do you though?” Jace pushes.

“Yeah. Seriously. I...I didn’t like how I felt. It was bad.”

“Okay,” Jace nods. “I’ll help you, okay? And, I’m not, like. I’m not trying to be a hypocrite or whatever. I did some stupid shit down in Nashville. I just want you to be okay, dude.”

Alec nods. “Meth?” he says quietly.

“Heroin,” Jace says, surprised that Alec had guessed at his crimes.

Alec shrugs. “I figured.” They’re both quiet. Alec honestly knew him better than anyone, knew him inside and out. How had Alec managed to keep a secret from _him_? But maybe he hadn’t really kept it a secret. Maybe somewhere, deep down, Jace had always sort of known.

“Did you like it?” Alec continues.

“Yeah,” Jace admits. “A lot.”

“Do you...do you think it’s going to be a problem?” Alec asks.

“No. I don’t want it. At all. Wanting it’s just another way I’d be like him,” Jace says, surprised by the bitterness in his voice.

“You’re not like him,” Alec says.

“How do you know?” Jace says, kicking his feet against the wall.

“Because you left,” Alec says, simply. “You came back. You made a choice.”

Jace nods slowly. God, he really did love Alec. This was miserable. He reaches into his backpack. “All of that said, about the drinking and shit -” he produces a bottle of champagne. “One night only exception. Strictly for birthday purposes.”

Alec laughs. “Got it.”

“And this -” Jace carefully takes out a small bakery box. “ - is just for you, because I’m definitely not going to eat it.” He opens the box to reveal a miniature cake. He’d inelegantly stuck a few candles in. He lights them carefully and passes the box to Alec.

“Is it Funfetti!??!” Alec yelps in a pitch that rivals some of Izzy’s best work.

“Of course it’s Funfetti, you animal,” Jace laughs. “You know you’re the only adult man alive who actively seeks out Funfetti cake.”

“One, not true. Two, it’s the best kind of cake.”

“It literally tastes the same as vanilla,” Jace says, his insides flooding with warmth at Alec’s happiness.

“You just have an unrefined palate,” Alec says. “Shh, I’m trying to make a wish.”

Jace shuts up, smiling as Alec looks intently at the cake for a moment. Jace wonders what he’s wishing for. He wonders if it’s about him. Of course it wasn’t. Alec had other things going on in his life besides this supposed crush on Jace. His fucking world didn’t revolve around Jace. He was being self-centered. Alec blows out the candles.

“What did you wish for?” Jace asks, before he can stop himself.

The corner of Alec’s mouth tugs up in a smile. “Can’t tell.”

“I hope it comes true,” says Jace.

“Me too.” Alec says.

A current of tension hangs between them. Izzy was right. Everything had changed. Izzy was wrong. Nothing had changed. Here was Alec, his Alec, who he loved. Here was Alec, his Alec, who loved him. What did it matter _how_ they loved each other? What form it took? What did it matter if they really both loved each other? He remembers a line they had translated once, in Latin class back in high school. He couldn’t remember it in Latin, his Latin had always been shit. But it translated to _between always and never_. That was him and Alec. Stuck somewhere between always and never.

Jace pops the champagne, breaking the moment. He holds it out to Alec. “Happy birthday, Al.”

Alec takes a long sip. “Cheers.” He looks at his cake. “You don’t happen to have a fork in there do you?”

“Ah,” Jace says. “Well. I knew there was something I was forgetting.”

Alec laughs. He hands the champagne bottle to Jace and grabs a piece of cake with his hand like a little kid. He shoves it into his mouth and chews noisily. “Delicious.”

“Disgusting,” Jace says.

“Sure you don’t want some?”

“Watching you eat with your hands is potentially the least appetizing thing I’ve ever seen, but thanks,” Jace laughs. He drinks some of the champagne and then hands it back to Alec. They sit like that for awhile, passing the bottle back and forth, not saying anything. Just looking at the view and being together 

“I have to tell you something,” Jace says. Alec starts; he’d apparently been lost in thought. “They don’t want your dad to run. Maryse told me.”

Alec exhales heavily. “Does he know yet?”

“Nope. It has nothing to do with you, by the way,” Jace says quickly. “If you’re thinking of trying to blame yourself.”

“I’ll probably always blame myself,” Alec says with a shrug. “But thank you for saying that.”

“Maryse thinks so too. She said it wasn’t your fault.”

Alec chews his lip. “He’s going to be very angry.”

“He will. Maryse thinks we should be gone by then.”

“She does?”

“Yep. As soon as you’re discharged. And Izzy is going back to New York tomorrow night.”

“Okay.”

Jace can’t tell what Alec’s expression means. “We can go back to our place,” he says, trying to cheer Alec. “We can get Persephone back from Mrs. Hammond.”

Now Alec smiles. “Awww do you think she missed us?”

“You know she did. And you missed her.”

“No I didn’t,” Alec says laughing.

“Alec, just admit it, you love that cat. We all know.”

“Never!”

Jace laughs too, passing the bottle of champagne back to Alec. Alec’s fingers brush against his, and a thrill goes through Jace’s spine. This was insane. He was making himself imagine things, getting obsessed with the idea of there being something between them. It was stupid. He just needed to bite the bullet and talk to Alec about it so they could clear the air.

Alec leans his head against the bell tower, looking out wistfully at the dying rays of the sunset. “I know you and Iz never really understood it, but God did I love it here.”

“I know you did. You do.” Jace pulls his knees up to his chest, holding them on the ledge. “You know when we were kids, and you used to try to explain to me why I should care about Catholicism?”

Alec half laughs. “Yeah. Sorry about that, by the way.”

“No,” Jace says. “I liked it. I didn’t always get it, but it clearly meant so much to you. I wanted it to mean something to me, too. Anyway, you used to tell me these stories. And they were so, just like, absolutely insane.”

Alec laughs. “Sounds right.”

“No, but in a good way,” Jace continues, not really sure what point he’s trying to make. They’ve finished the champagne now. “It sounded like magic to me. Stories where angels came and saved the day, stories with heroes. Stories where people did the right thing. Stories where people did the wrong thing and they were punished. I had never heard stories like that. I didn’t exactly grow up reading fairy tales, let alone the Bible.”

Alec nods, his head cocked as he listens.

“And if you could believe in magic stories like that, you had to be a pretty magical person.” Alec looks down now, blushing. “You made me want to believe in it. And I think I do, in some ways. Not God really, not all the formal shit. But…” he trails off. He really doesn’t know where he’s going with this, but suddenly feels like it’s vitally important to get it out. “But sacredness. I think that’s what I learned from you. Nothing was sacred where I came from. I think you taught me that things could be holy. Little things. Like everyday shit. You made stuff matter.”

Alec is staring at him openly now.

“Does that make sense?” Jace says, self-conscious.

“No. I mean, yes. It does.” Alec’s voice sounds raspy and he swallows hard. “Thank you. That’s. That’s really nice.”

Jace shrugs. “It’s true.” Alec is still looking at him. “Happy Birthday,” he says again.

Alec looks like he’s about to say something and suddenly Jace panics, aware he’s said too much. He’s gone too far. “I wish we could go in,” he says, not really meaning anything by it.

“We can,” Alec says.

“It’s locked, my friend. Nighttime and all.”

Alec rolls his eyes at him. “Please, do you know how often we locked ourselves out of the sacristy? We had to have a way to break in.”

“Yeah?” Jace asks, impressed. He had said it mostly to break the moment, but he wouldn’t mind going in the sanctuary. It feels appropriate, somehow. It’s dark now, the sun had set infinitesimally and then vanished all at once.

“Yeah,” Alec says. “Let’s do it.”

They scramble back down the facade. Scientifically it’s impossible that Jace is tipsy from half a bottle of champagne, he can drink half a bottle of gin without getting drunk. But something about the night, the view, the energy between them was making him feel lightheaded, like he was floating outside of his body.

They go around the side building, where the offices are. Alec stands on his tiptoes and pushes a window in. “I’ll climb through and let you in.”

“What, you think I can’t climb through the window?!” Jace says, offended.

Alec has already jumped up on the ledge. “You’re too short, bud.”

“Wow. Wow.” Jace says in mock outrage. “Watch me.”

Alec gracefully throws one leg into the open window and then drops inside. Jace climbs onto the ledge after him. “Too short,” he mutters under his breath. “Maybe you’re too tall, Alec.” Now that he’s up on the ledge though it’s clear he absolutely is too short to climb in the way Alec had. “How did you do this when you were kids?” he calls through the window. It’s dark inside, but he can see the Alec in the half light, looking up at him and shaking his head.

“We stood on each other’s shoulders,” Alec says.

Jace has to pull himself up over the windowsill, the metal cutting into his hands. He pushes himself through and falls with a thud to the floor at Alec’s feet. Alec laughs uproariously.

“Fuck you, man,” Jace mutters, brushing himself off as he stands.  

Still laughing, Alec pushes open the door of the office and points down the hallway. “This way.” He’s whispering, and there’s a thrill of juvenile excitement at trespassing. It feels like such gentle mischief, it reminds Jace of being a kid. He trips down the hall after Alec, and Alec pushes the heavy door to the sanctuary open.

“Wow,” Jace murmurs as they step in. He’d been in there a million times of course, maybe more. But somehow it was transformed in the darkness. The stone, the dark wood, the oil paintings, the confessionals - everything that felt so standard during the day was made strange and exotic in the night. It felt mystical. It felt holy.

Alec wanders toward the altar, running his fingers over the pews.

“It’s beautiful,” Jace breaths.

“I know.”

They both wander for a few minutes, exploring the dark crevices of the cathedral. It was strange how profoundly darkness could render a known object unknown. It felt like they had crossed over into some sort of liminal space. There was no outside world in here. It was just him and Alec. Just two bodies, the only two living things left on earth. Or maybe they were in heaven now. Maybe they weren’t on earth at all.

Jace catches up to Alec standing in front of the altar, looking up at the enormous rendering of the Crucifixion in contemplation.

“What’d ya think?” Jace asks in a low whisper, coming up behind Alec.

Alec jumps a little.

“Sorry,” Jace says. They don’t really need to whisper, but it feels appropriate somehow.

“I think maybe Jesus had it wrong,” Alec says.

Jace gasps dramatically, but then realizes Alec is serious. “What do you mean?”

“I mean maybe climbing up on a cross alone never helped anyone,” Alec breaths. “Maybe it’s braver to fight. To live.”

Jace’s heart is in his throat. He’s standing just behind Alec. He can hear the steady rhythm of Alec’s breath, smell the sweat that lingers on his neck from the climb. He has the strangest urge to reach out and touch Alec. To run his finger along Alec’s hairline, to feel the baby hairs at the nape of his neck acquiesce to Jace’s touch.

He turns abruptly and walks in the other direction, not totally trusting his hands. There’s a confessional in front of him and he slips into the priest's side, leaning his head against the wood paneling. He needs a moment to collect himself, to get whatever’s gone completely off the fucking rails in his brain back on track. He exhales, and then hears Alec step into the other side of the confessional. He can’t see him, of course, but he can feel him, just on the other side of the grate. Their breathing sounds louder than it’s supposed to, echoing in the tiny wooden box.

He hears Alec swallow. “Forgive me Father, for I have sinned,” Alec says. His voice is barely above a whisper. A prayer.

Jace licks his lips. “What sins have you committed?” He can’t remember what exactly the priest usually says. He hasn’t gone to Confession in years. He thinks that’ll be the end of it, but Alec continues.

“I have committed a mortal sin.”

Jace freezes. Was he talking about homosexuality? Because if so he had a thing or two to say about that, cathedral or not. “Which commandment have you violated?” Jace asks slowly.

“I have coveted,” Alec says in a rush.

Jace feels like they’re back up in the bell tower, standing on the ledge. Leaning over it, peering down into the void. If either of them breathed wrong it all could come tumbling down. He swallows carefully. “What have you coveted?”

It’s silent on the other side of the grate. Jace’s heart is hammering in his chest. He’s sure Alec can hear it. He’s holding his breath, waiting for Alec’s answer. But then he hears the accordion door slide open and the sound of Alec’s footsteps on the stone floor.

He pushes his door open as well and follows Alec out. “Alec,” he says, speaking at a normal volume for the first time. But Alec keeps going, until he’s at the opposite end of the hall in front of the shrine to St. James. He drops to his knees on one of the pedestals at the shrine, sitting back on his feet and hanging his head.

  
Slowly, Jace follows him over to the enclave. He goes to the stand and lights a candle. The flickering light throws shadows over Alec’s bent form. Jace stands still, looking at the line of Alec’s shoulders, which betray his uneven breathing. 

“Alec,” he says. He just has to do it. He has to end this. “Alec, are you in love with me?” 

Alec looks up. His eyes find Jace’s for the faintest second, and then they flicker back down. It’s deadly silent in the cathedral.

“Yes,” Alec breathes. He sounds defeated, undone. “I’m so sorry.”

Alec leans back further on his heels, but now he lifts his head to look at Jace. His expression, cast in the half light of the candle, begs for forgiveness.

Jace shakes his head. “Why are you sorry?” He feels calmer, surprisingly, now that Alec has confirmed it. He hadn’t thought Izzy was wrong, of course, but he thought it would be different to hear it from Alec himself, to have indisputable proof. Jace thinks, suddenly, of the way tectonic plates were always moving, shifting and resettling beneath our feet without disruption. That was what this felt like. Just plates settling.

Alec stares at him, dumbstruck. “Because I’ve ruined everything.”

“Stand up,” Jace says. 

Alec looks skeptical.

“Jace,” he starts, supplication in his voice.

“Stand up,” Jace repeats.

Alec does. He takes one step towards Jace, and then freezes. Jace takes one step towards Alec. There’s no more than a foot between them, the light of the candle dancing eerily, elongating their faces strangely. But the face before him is the only one he’s ever truly known.

Jace had lived his whole life calculating. Calculating the potential for damage, calculating the likelihood of having a roof over his head. Calculating what Michael’s mood would be based on the number of beer bottles on the floor. Calculating his opponent’s weak points in the ring. Calculating how much he needed to fake it so the Lightwoods would keep him. But for the first time in his life, Jace stops calculating. He takes one more step towards Alec, closing the distance between them as if he was stepping over some sort of invisible boundary. He crosses the line not caring about consequences, or the meaning, or the future _._ He crosses the line and does exactly what he wants. He kisses Alec.

For a moment Alec doesn’t respond. Alec’s lips are tightly closed, he seems stunned. Jace hesitates, keeping his mouth on Alec’s. It’s strange; it feels both familiar and foreign. Alec still hasn’t breathed. Jace is about to pull away, to apologize and plead temporary insanity, when Alec’s lips part and he inhales sharply. And then he kisses Jace back. It’s slow and tentative, a kiss that feels laden with longing. He tastes the question on Alec’s lips. _Are you sure?_ He’s sure. He opens his mouth, feeling the little gasp of surprise that escape’s Alec’s lips. He kisses him harder, bringing one hand to the back of Alec’s neck, pressing his fingers into those hairs he had longed to disrupt earlier. His hand is strong against Alec’s head and he pulls him closer and now Alec’s lips acquiesce to him. Jace is falling into him, he’s going to drown in the taste, the smell of him. And he needs more. His mouth open, he runs his tongue against Alec’s lower lip, asking permission. He feels Alec’s body respond, feels Al weaken against him, into him.

And then Alec jumps back, breaking the kiss and wrenching Jace’s hand from his neck. They’re both breathing hard. Alec’s eyes are wild, searching Jace’s face.

“Jace,” he starts, rubbing his thumb shakily across his lips. “Why?” he trails off, the beginning of his question hanging in the air.

“Didn’t you want me to?” Jace says, uncertain now.

“Of course _I_ wanted you to,” Alec stays, his breathing still uneven. “But you don’t...you’re not…”

Jace shrugs. “I wanted to. So I did it.” Alec shakes his head in wonder, like he’s suddenly completely lost his grip on the English language. “To be honest, I want to do it again,” Jace says, and now it’s his turn to be uncertain. He looks up at Alec through his eyelashes, giving him the choice.

“You want to kiss me. Again.” Alec says, still apparently struggling to regain his command of language.

“Yes,” Jace says simply.

Alec gapes at him for a moment. And then it’s his turn to close the gap between them. This time there's no hesitation, no asking for permission. Alec kisses him with a hunger that almost unmoors Jace. He’s never been kissed like that before. Now Alec is in control; Jace feels his thumb on his cheekbone as Alec grips Jace’s head. Jace’s body is burning as he kisses him back passionately, their skin touching at every possible point of contact. Alec’s tongue slips into his mouth and Jace lets out a little moan of pleasure, feeling it in every nerve ending of his body.

And then the silence of the cathedral is shattered by the echoing ring of a cell phone. The boys jump apart as if they’ve just been caught. Jace’s heart is racing. He reaches into his pocket, trying to find his phone. And then Alec’s phone is ringing too, the competing trills bouncing off the high ceilings.

“Fuck,” Jace says shakily. He feels like he’s just been pulled, half-drowned and unbreathing, from a roaring river.

“I think we’re in trouble,” Alec says.

***

They were, to put it lightly, in trouble. It had been Maryse calling Alec, and Izzy looking for Jace. The nurses had apparently discovered Alec missing and called Maryse. They both assured her that Alec was fine and safe, everything was okay.

Jace genuinely did not know if everything was okay.

They drive back to the hospital in silence. Jace’s mind is buzzing, but he can’t catch any of his thoughts long enough to look at them properly. He can only feel Alec’s kiss, the lingering hunger of it burning on his lips. It wasn’t just a kiss. It was a plea, a prayer, a call to action. An invocation to do something terrible, something that they couldn’t take back.

Alec takes a determined breath from time to time, as if he’s working himself up to saying something. The fourth time he manages to say only, “Listen." 

Jace shakes his head. “Let’s talk about it later. It’ll be fine.”

“We don’t have to talk about it,” Alec says. “We can just…”

“No,” says Jace, “I don’t think it’s going to work like that.”

Alec sighs heavily. “I know.”

Neither of them speak again. Jace pulls up at the hospital entrance.

“Do you want me to come in with you?” Jace asks.

“It’s okay,” Alec says, unbuckling his seatbelt. “I can’t get in too much trouble.” They sit for a moment in awkward silence. Jace doesn’t know what to say. “Well. Thanks.” Alec says, his voice sad as he fumbles out of the car.

Alec’s already turned his back to him, heading towards the entrance. But Jace can’t stand it anymore. “Alec!” he yells after him. Alec whips around, hope etched on his face. “Happy Birthday.”

Alec smiles, and Jace smiles back at him. They nod to each other in a moment of unspoken understanding. And then Alec enters the hospital, looking for all the world like a soldier surrendering in enemy territory.

Jace drives home carefully, forcing himself to hyperfocus on the road, the street signs, the shitty pop song on the radio (he changes it when a Little Things song comes on). He goes in through the servant’s entrance, hoping to avoid getting yelled at by Maryse. He flips on the lights in the foyer, revealing Izzy, sitting in an armchair like some sitcom dad whose daughter missed curfew.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Jace says, jumping a mile. “Have you just been sitting there waiting for me?!”

“No,” Izzy laughs. “I heard you open the garage door and thought it would be funny.”

“How pissed is Maryse?” Jace says, massaging his forehead. He really doesn’t want to talk to Izzy right now. He wants to go lay down on the floor or possibly under the ocean and scream for awhile.

“She was more worried than angry. She went to the hospital. And Robert’s at the DC apartment. I played dumb, don’t worry,” Izzy says, flipping her braid over her shoulder.

“You didn’t know where we were either,” Jace points out.

“No, but I knew you had taken him somewhere. I knew he was fine. I just acted scandalized.”

“Thanks,” Jace says, trudging towards the staircase.

“Did you guys have a nice time?” Izzy says, in a very leading tone.

“I’m going to bed,” Jace says.

“It’s, like, 9 o’clock.”

“Goodnight, Izzy,” Jace says definitively.

He locks the door to his bedroom before collapsing face down on the bed. They were certainly fucked now. Why had he done that? It wasn’t fair to Alec, it was too confusing, jerking him around like that. Now how was he supposed to tell Alec it was fine he had feelings for him but that they would just find a way to get past it? What if they did something like that again? They couldn’t be alone together, he didn’t trust himself. Well. That was the problem, wasn’t it. Because the entire drive home, Jace has been aware that he was resolutely not thinking of just how much he enjoyed that kiss. That he had initiated it, he had wanted it. He had wanted Alec.

What did that make him? He was less interested in if he was gay, or bisexual, or whatever. Frankly, he didn’t really care about labeling that. If he liked men, fine, but liking Alec...Jace couldn’t do this. There was no way this ended well. He had gone to the church with the intention of clearing things between them, not further muddying them. He worries that they’re reaching the point of no return. But there was no future here. Two boys raised as brothers didn’t suddenly announce they were dating. And dating felt so profoundly inconsequential a word, inadequate for the bond he and Alec shared. Jace dated two or three girls a month. He and Alec were tied together, their lives inextricably bound up in each others. Besides, there was no getting around the fact that despite everything, they were still really from different worlds. Alec was the best person he knew. The kindest, most selfless, most _noble_. Who was even noble anymore? Alec Lightwood, that’s fucking who. Someone like that had no business being with Jace. Alec wanted to change the world. He couldn’t do that with someone like him as a partner.  He couldn’t bring Alec down with him. He wouldn’t.

Jace is starting to have trouble breathing, so he flops over onto his back. What would have happened if their phones hadn’t rung? If they had continued kissing. What would have happened next? Where would they have stopped? _Would_ they have stopped? He’s not at all confident he wouldn’t have started taking Alec’s clothes off. The idea is both thrilling and terrifying to Jace. He tries to imagine what would have happened next, to see if he can visualize it. But his imagination seemed to short circuit at the moment their phones had rung. Maybe that meant he didn’t want anything further to happen, right? That it was just an experiment. There was nothing wrong with an experiment, especially when things were so confusing. How else were you supposed to know what you wanted? But he thinks of the way his body had responded when Alec grabbed his face. The taste of Alec on his tongue.

There’s a knock on the door. He sighs. “I said I was going to bed, Izzy.”

“I know. Can you just open the door a second?”

Jace shakes his head. The girl really did not understand being told no. Begrudgingly, he gets up and opens the door.

“I know you’re going to bed,” she says quickly. “But I brought you some pizza.” She passes the box to him.

“Thanks.”

“I wasn’t sure if you guys had dinner,” she continues. Jace shakes his head. Izzy lingers. “So, Alec texted me. He asked me to come over to the hospital. But, um. I think I should maybe be done. With meddling.”

Jace smiles tightly. “Maybe.”

“I’m sorry,” Izzy says sadly. “I only ever wanted to help.”

“I know. Alec and I will figure this out though. Don’t worry,” Jace says, feeling far less confident than he sounds.

“I’m going to go see him. To say goodbye. I leave for New York tomorrow. Can I say goodbye to you now?”

Jace nods, putting the pizza box down in his room. “Come here.”

Izzy hugs him tightly, her head resting on his shoulder. “I don’t want anything to change for the three of us,” she confesses in a half whisper.

“It won’t. Next time we see you, this will all be figured out.” Jace promises. He knows it’s a lie. It’s too late.

“Love you,” Izzy whispers.

“You too,” Jace says, realizing with a sinking feeling of certainty that he’d always meant something very, very different when he said _I love you_ to Izzy then he had when he told their other sibling the same thing.  

 

**Alec, 21**

The scream of the helicopter blades drowns out everything except the thumping rhythm of his heart. He adjusts his headphones, glancing at Jace, who nods back at him. It had been two days since his birthday, two days since the church. Since the kiss. They hadn’t talked about it, operating on some sort of unspoken agreement that the priority would be getting back to Boston. He had been discharged that morning, and Mother had given him about five minutes to pack his things before dispatching him and Jace on the helicopter. Jace had tried to tell her they would just fly commercial, but she was adamant. He wondered if she was scared of Robert, or just scared of what he would say to Alec. He didn’t like to think about either option.

Jace looks up from his phone and speaks into the headset. “I told Mrs. Hammond we were coming. We can pick up Persephone on our way home.”

“Great, thanks for doing that.” Alec says. “Let’s also stop at the grocery store.”

“Good idea,” Jace says. They’re both being strangely polite, using formality to keep a distance between them, to maintain order. Like they were seated next to each other on an international flight and were determined not to make their forced proximity weird.

“I think we need cat food too,” Alec offers.

“I’ll make a list,” Jace says. “Let me know if you think of anything else.”

“Perfect.” Alec says.

“I still think we need new blinds in the living room. The kitchen too, probably. Maybe we can do that before school starts,” Jace says, as if talking about banal realities will ground them somehow, keep them from slipping off the edge of the world into nothingness again.

“That’s smart,” Alec agrees. “We can do that this week.” It had surprised him, at first, how much pride Jace took in maintaining their apartment. Alec was accustomed to nice places, of course, and he liked their place to be clean and well decorated, but Jace took it to another level. He was obsessed with design schemes and vacuuming and fixing things the moment they broke. Alec usually just left things that needed attention, used as he was to a member of their household staff appearing, unsummoned, to fix it. But Jace was handy, and he would immediately get under the sink or up on a ladder himself. It had taken Alec a few months to realize that Jace had never felt ownership of a place before, had never trusted that a home was irrevocably his. After that Alec had let him do whatever he wanted with the apartment.

“I’m going to try and take a nap,” Jace says, lowering the microphone on his headset.

Alec and Jace both knew that there was absolutely no universe where Jace would be able to fall asleep on the helicopter in the middle of the afternoon. But he understood that Jace didn’t necessarily want to spend time with him right now. He nods, permitting the lie, and Jace turns his head toward the window and shuts his eyes.

Alec didn’t blame Jace for the formal, distant way he was treating him, but it still irritated him. He couldn’t for the life of him figure out why Jace had kissed him that night. What the fuck was he thinking? Not that Alec hadn’t enjoyed it. No, it turned out that kissing Jace was every bit as intoxicating as it had been in Alec’s dreams. He could still feel the way his entire body had buzzed, as if electrified, when Jace first pressed his lips to his. And the taste of Jace in his mouth. There was no dream that could have prepared him for that. Or for the way Jace’s fingers had closed around the curls at the nape of his neck.

 _Stop it_ he thinks. He doesn’t need to revisit this, especially not while he’s trapped in a confined space with Jace. The question wasn’t whether _he_ wanted Jace, it was what had possessed Jace to kiss him. He knew Jace wasn’t gay, and he certainly wasn’t attracted to his own brother. He wasn’t as profoundly fucked up as Alec. The only explanation Alec can think of is that he had been trying to be nice. He had learned that Alec was in love with him and, as a sort of consolation prize/birthday present, offered him the kiss. Like how you go along with a friend’s birthday plans even though you really hate that restaurant. It made him feel pathetic, like a charity case. He didn’t want Jace’s pity.

But also...that kiss. Jesus. It had been better than anything he could have hoped for. It had awakened something in him that he didn’t even know he was still denying. He thought he had accepted all of this; his sexuality, his feelings for Jace, everything. He had made his peace with it. And then Jace had put his lips against his and the entire foundation of Alec’s life had been knocked out from under him. It had been a taste, a taste of a life he would never know. But now that he’d had a taste he genuinely wasn’t sure he was going to be able to live with this. It was like Jace had lit a fire inside of him, and now all he did was burn. He was going to burn up, implode like a dying star, unless Jace touched him again. Kissed him again. But he wouldn’t. Alec knew that. He wondered if Jace had felt anything near what he felt when he kissed him. Just technically speaking, wasn’t it impossible that the kiss could have been that earth-shattering for him yet for Jace to have felt nothing? That wasn’t the way kissing worked, was it? This was the type of thing he would have asked Jace, had Jace not been the one who was doing the kissing.

Jace is leaning his head against the window, eyes closed, but Alec knows he’s not asleep. Helicopter travel was convenient if you were used to the deafening noise, but it was also irritating as shit. Struck, suddenly, Alec, switches off the mic on his headset. Into the roar of the helicopter, Alec whispers, “Why did you kiss me?”

Jace, of course, can’t hear him and doesn’t stir.

So Alec asks again, louder this time. “Why did you do that to me?”

Jace still hasn’t moved. It’s impossible that he could hear Alec.

“You started a fire and it’s going to burn me alive,” Alec yells at Jace.

Jace doesn’t open his eyes.

“I love you,” Alec admits into the oblivion. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

Nobody hears him. Nobody cares.

***

Jace unlocks the door to their apartment and Alec follows him inside. It smells a bit stale, the scent of stagnant summer air permeating the room. Jace immediately goes to open some of the windows, and Alec kneels down, putting Persephone’s case on the floor. He unzips the bag and lets her out. With a howl she darts across the room, making a beeline for her favorite hiding spot behind the couch. She didn’t like being moved, it was very undignified.

“Welcome home, baby,” Alec says.

Jace turns around, his expression bemused.

“I was talking to the cat,” Alec says, cheeks burning in mortification.

“Oh,” Jace says. “Well. Welcome home.”

Jace holds his gaze for a moment, but Alec breaks the connection, looking down at his hands. He’s still squatting on the floor next to Persephone’s case, and he can’t understand why he hasn’t moved. He continues staring at his hands as if he suddenly finds them wildly interesting.

“So,” Jace says.

“Let’s unpack a little,” Alec says briskly.

“Okay. Good idea,” Jace says.

Both boys grab their suitcases and walk quickly to their bedrooms. He hears Jace shut his bedroom door behind him. God. Now they couldn’t even be in the same room without getting embarrassed? This was a nightmare. This was exactly what he hadn’t wanted, why he had sworn he was never going to tell Jace about his feelings. He still didn’t completely understand how Jace had figured it out. He supposed he wasn’t particularly subtle, although he had tried his best to hide it. He wondered if Izzy was involved. If she was, he was going to personally insure that she never knew peace again. It would be just like Izzy to think she was helping by getting involved. She had come over to the hospital after the kiss to commiserate with him. (Was he going to start dividing time into Pre-Kiss and Post-Kiss? Was he the most pathetic person alive? Probably.) Izzy had listened while he recounted what happened and expressed the same degree of bafflement he felt, but she had remained strangely quiet throughout the conversation. It was probably unfair to her, he realized, to continually put her in the middle of this. Whatever “this” even was. He would leave her out of it from now on. But it had been nice to have someone he could speak freely to, someone who understood, who loved Jace as much as he did even if it wasn’t in the same way.

After about eight minutes there’s simply not that much more for Alec to do in his room. He ventures out in the hallway to put a load of laundry in, but finds that Jace has beat him to it.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Jace says, gesturing at Alec’s armful of laundry.

“No, no problem. I’ll go next.” Alec says, feeling keenly aware of the amount of underwear he’s holding. He felt profoundly shy, suddenly, in front of Jace. He hadn’t even been this shy when they’d first met as awkward eleven year olds. He remembers that first night, when he had heard Jace crying and had slipped over into this bedroom. How they had slept together, innocently, fraternally, that night and for so many nights to come. When had things changed for him? When had he stopped seeing the body next to him in bed as a comforting, friendly presence and started longing for it? Was it gradual, or all at once? He couldn’t remember now. He thinks of the old metaphor about boiling a frog, or whatever it was. You don’t notice the water getting hotter degree by degree, but then suddenly it was boiling and the frog was dead. Something like that. Well, the water had certainly boiled.

Alec turns on his heel and walks back to his room, dumping the pile of laundry on his bed. He hears footsteps behind him. Was Jace coming to his room? He fervently hopes that he isn’t, while simultaneously longing for Jace to follow him in, to grab him, to throw him down on his bed and pin Alec’s body underneath his.

Alec lets out a shaky exhale and looks up. Jace is standing in the doorway.

“It’s nice to be back,” Jace says neutrally.

“Yeah.”

He leans against the frame, crossing his arms. “Weird fuckin’ summer, though, huh?”

Alec laughs flatly. “You could say that.” Jace doesn’t move one way or the other, hovering on the doorstep. Alec is fiercely reminded of a vampire waiting for an invitation in. He wonders if Jace doesn’t want to come in because he doesn’t want to make _him_ uncomfortable. Or if Jace is just too uncomfortable to be in Alec’s bedroom now. He needs to know what Jace had possibly been thinking. It was unfathomable that Jace had actually _wanted_ him. That wasn’t the way this thing worked. He just needs to ask him.

“So,” Alec starts. “Speaking of this summer -”

“I know,” Jace says heavily. “We need to talk.”

They both pause, the kiss hanging between them like a wrecking ball. Then they both laugh, awkwardly, at the silence. “Want to have dinner? I’m starving,” Jace says. “Then we can talk.”

“Sounds good,” Alec says in relief. He wondered how long they were physically going to be able to put this off for before the tension just devoured both of them. Hopefully forever.

He follows Jace into the kitchen, surveying the groceries they had picked up. He feels keenly aware of where their bodies are, the space they’re occupying. Their kitchen was tiny, and usually if there was more than one person in there you were guaranteed to do a fair amount of slamming into each other. But it feels like he and Jace are both holding themselves rigidly, trying to ensure that there isn’t even the slightest bit of contact between them. Alec is all but pressing himself flat against the wall, trying to stay out of Jace’s way as we unloads the groceries.

“You wanna help me?” Jace asks with a laugh.

“Oh sure. Sorry,” Alec says, coming quickly to the table. He grabs a couple boxes of pasta and moves towards the cabinet. Jace takes a huge step back to get out of his way. “Sorry,” Alec mutters again.

“No worries,” Jace says, studying the table. God. He must really not want Alec to touch him. He wonders if Jace hates him. If Jace is repulsed by him, by what they did. Maybe he doesn’t even want to be in the same apartment as him anymore, let alone live there together. They finish putting away the groceries in silence, their bodies circling the room like two oppositely charged magnets.

“What do you want for dinner?” Alec asks to break the silence. “I’ll make whatever.”

Jace shrugs. “Whatever’s easy.”

Alec has temporarily forgotten what things humans generally eat for dinner. “Ummm,” he says, trying to recall a single thing he has ever cooked in the past.

“We could just have cereal,” Jace suggests.

“No,” Alec says. “I’ll make something.” He looks in the fridge. “Do you want paella?”

Jace stares at him. “Doesn’t that take like, two hours to cook?”

Alec shrugs. “I’m not that hungry yet, are you?”

“No,” Jace says slowly. “That’s fine. As long as you don’t mind making it.”

“No, I think it will be good,” Alec says.

“Do you want help?” Jace offers politely.

“That would be great, thank you.”

Jace starts dicing vegetables at Alec’s instructions, while Alec fishes out their paella pan. They’re both quiet, speaking only to each other when they have questions or polite requests. _Can you please pass me the olive oil? Did we get fresh garlic? The knife with the brown handle is better for tomatoes. Do you like artichoke hearts, I can’t remember._

At some point Jace goes into the living room and plugs his phone into the speaker system. He’s playing _Pet Sounds_ , The Beach Boys’ album. He always plays _Pet Sounds_ when he’s feeling introspective, which Alec finds hilarious as Jace spends the rest of his time listening to Kendrick Lamar and Chance the Rapper. He might as well have hung a sign around his neck announcing he was feeling vulnerable.

Jace returns to his vegetables, singing along under his breath. “God only knows what I’d be without you,” he sings softly. “If you should ever leave me, though life would still go on, believe me, the world could show nothing to me, so what good would living do me?”

Alec stares at him. Had he chosen this song intentionally? Of course not. He’d put the album on shuffle, Alec was sure. But still. Each word felt like the prick of a needle. To Jace it might mean nothing, but for Alec, it was all too real, and all too possible a looming future. What if Jace were to leave him? He genuinely didn’t know if he was able to function without him, not after all these years. He knew that he didn’t want to function without Jace, that was certain. But if Jace was angry with him, disgusted by him, why would he play this song? Why would he stand in the kitchen with him and chop bell peppers and sing along. Why would he allow Alec’s heart to swell with longing, to make him fervently wish that they would abandon this pretense of formality. Was it possible, was there literally any possible timeline, where Jace wanted Alec to cross the room, to take his face between his hands and kiss him just as desperately as Alec wanted to do those things? Or would that be more pity? More crumbs that Jace offered him because he felt bad for Alec and his pathetic, twisted obsession.

Jace apparently feels Alec’s eyes on him, because he looks up. For a moment, there’s something on Jace’s face that Alec can’t identify. Something wild. Something that looks like...well, something that looks like longing. But then it’s gone, so quickly that Alec is sure he imagined it. “Veggies are ready,” Jace says, offering the cutting board to Alec. And the polite, detached look in his eyes convinces Alec he was just imagining things.

“Thanks,” Alec says. But he doesn’t move. They’re still just looking at each other. Alec can feel his heart in his throat. The washing machine buzzes, intrusively announcing the end of its cycle.

“I’ll go move the laundry along,” Jace says, looking away from Alec. “Want me to put your clothes in?”

“That’d be great,” Alec says. “Just the stuff on the bed.”

Jace nods and disappears, which is good because Alec genuinely think he needs to sit down for a moment. How were they possibly so far gone they couldn’t even look at each other anymore? Alec had thought that maybe cooking dinner would give them a chance to settle in, for them to relax back into being at home. But it was just making the tension rise higher. They just needed to say it, to speak out loud what had happened and to mutually agree that it was over, in the past. But that wasn’t going to magically make Alec forget what it had felt like. It wasn’t going to make Alec forget that, on his last night in the hospital, he had awoken from a dream so intense that, in the twilight fog between waking and sleeping, he’d masturbated, imagining Jace was there with him, imagining that it was Jace’s hand on his dick. He’d felt so disgusted with himself afterwards that he’d gotten up and showered, as if he could cleanse his brain as well. It felt like he had violated Jace, thinking of him like that when he knew Jace would be repulsed.

From the other room, it sounds like Jace has restarted _Pet Sounds_. Alec stands back up and goes to the stove to check the rice. Jace struts into the kitchen, holding Persephone in his arms. He holds one of her paws like they’re waltzing, singing along. “This album is all about you Persy, did you know that? Pet Sounds. That’s you, get it?”

Alec laughs, watching Jace dance with their cat. It’s deeply endearing. “She’s going to bite you,” he says.

“Nooooo, Persy, you’re not gonna bite me are you? You love to dance!” Jace spins her around the room faster, and Alec laughs. He knows exactly what Jace is doing, being silly, trying to set them both at ease. He appreciates it. As expected, Persephone gets sick of this game very quickly and yelps, jumping down from Jace’s arms and running out of the kitchen.

“Told ya,” Alec says.

Jace laughs, dropping into a chair. “She didn’t bite me though, so you can’t ‘told ya’ me.”

Alec shakes his head at him. “I can and I will.”

For a moment it almost feels normal, like everything was maybe okay between them. But then they both fall silent and there’s that same undercurrent of tension, lurking just beneath the surface. Alec turns back to the stove, stirring carefully.

“We should be ready to eat soon,” he says.

“Great,” says Jace. He stands and goes to their liquor cabinet, which he opens and then shuts again without removing anything. He hesitates.

“Jace,” Alec says. “You can drink in front of me. I’m not like, in a 12 step program.”

Jace hoists himself up to sit on the counter. “Do you think you should be?” he asks lightly.

“No. I’m not an alcoholic,” Alec says, stirring the paella with perhaps a bit more force than is strictly necessary.

“You just spent two weeks in the hospital because you crashed your car driving drunk,” Jace says.

Alec glares at him, stung that Jace would say that so flippantly. As if Alec didn’t feel awful about it every moment of the day.

“I’ll go with you,” Jace says. “To a meeting. I think the principles are the same, for opioids.”

Alec starts. “But you said you were doing okay with it, that you didn’t want to use.”

Jace shrugs. “I don’t, right now at least. But. I dunno. It scares me how easy it was. It’s strange that it only takes, like, seconds to fall into something. And then ages to pull yourself out of it. I don’t want to be caught unprepared if something ever changes.” Jace says all this to his hands, still perched on the counter. Alec wants to go to him, to stand between Jace’s legs and put his hands on his hips and promise Jace he’s never going to leave him alone again.

“Okay,” Alec says. “I think that’s probably a good idea. I’ll find a meeting for us to go to.”

Jace nods. “Just let me know when.”

“Thanks,” Alec says. “Okay. Ready for paella?”

“Please,” says Jace. “What is it, midnight?”

“That took an hour to make, aka the normal amount of time for a meal that is not Hot Cheetos.”

“There is nothing wrong with Hot Cheetos, please try and keep your elitism in check,” Jace says, jumping down from the counter and grabbing the bowl Alec offers him.

They eat at the kitchen table, Persephone winding her way around their legs and meowing loudly the entire time.

“This is really good,” Jace says. “Thanks, Alec.”

“You’re welcome,” Alec says, groaning internally at his politeness. “Do you want seconds?”

“I’m okay, thanks though.”

“No problem,” Alec says. He wasn’t sure how much longer they could sustain this. They manage to make it through dinner, discussing which classes they need to take next semester. Jace is horrified to learn that Alec has been emailing with his thesis advisor all summer, which gives Alec the opportunity to give a long speech about the importance of thesis prep.

Jace clears the table and Alec allows himself to watch, drumming his fingers against his knee. He knows he just needs to bite the bullet, they’ve put this off for long enough. But he can’t find the words to do it. Part of the problem, he supposes, is that as much as he knows this conversation needs to happen, having it will forever kill the tiny, glimmering seed of hope that currently lives in Alec’s chest. The seed that had been planted when Jace touched him, that whispered against his heart _maybe_ . Such a dangerous word; maybe. It was better to know definitively, to rip things out by the roots. “Maybes” only allowed for chaos, for self-doubt and longing. _Maybe_ there was a world where Jace wanted him back. _Maybe_ there was a way they could work this out. _Maybe_ Jace loved him just as ridiculously, just as desperately as he loved Jace. _Maybe maybe maybe_.

“Jace,” He says, his voice sounding oddly strangled.

“I know,” Jace says. “Let’s talk.”

He turns around, leaning against the counter. Alec is still at the kitchen table. Neither of them says anything for a moment, both of them not looking at each other. Finally Jace laughs a little, and Alec looks up at him.

“This is miserable,” Jace says. “Let’s just put that out there.”

“Agreed.” Alec says, almost smiling.

They’re both quiet again, waiting for the other to take the lead.

“We’re really terrible at this,” Jace says, shaking his head.

Alec finally just blurts it out. “Why did you kiss me?”

Jace sighs. “I don’t know. I’m sorry. I’m sure it was...confusing. But I wanted to. And I’ve never been good at denying myself what I want.”

“You didn’t want to,” Alec says, before he can stop himself.

“What?” Jace says, almost laughing. “You don’t know what I want.”

“Yes!” Alec says, feeling his voice rise. “I do know! You did it because you feel bad for me. You were trying to be nice.”

“Jesus, Alec. I’m not that nice.”

Alec rolls his eyes. “Yes, you are. You’re not even gay!”

“Are you trying to talk me out of being attracted to you?” Jace demands.

Alec’s already taken a breath to continue and is forced to swallow a lot of air, opening and closing his mouth. He stares, uncomprehending, at Jace. “Are you saying you’re attracted to me?” he asks slowly, needing confirmation before he even tries to understand this.

“Clearly! Do you think I go around kissing people I’m not attracted to?”

“I don’t know,” Alec says defensively.

“And you’re, you know,” Jace says, “definitely into me? Even after the kissing and everything?”

“Even after?” Alec repeats. He’d tried to walk through this conversation endless times in preparation, but there was literally no timeline where Alec had been capable of imagining this. “I told you I was in love with you,” Alec says, voice hoarse.

“I know,” Jace has started to pace in front of the sink. “I’m just making sure, you still. You know. Feel that way.”

Alec’s world is tilting off balance. He stands up, needing to move, but the kitchen is too small for him to really go anywhere. He walks into the living room. Jace trails behind him. The idea that kissing Jace would have in any way been off putting to Alec is so profoundly mind-blowing, he can’t even figure out how to formulate a response. 

“It’s okay,” Jace says. He’s leaning against the wall, looking at Alec. “If you were wrong, or whatever. If you want to just put it behind us.”

Alec sits down with a dull thud on the couch. “Oh. I get it. You weren’t sure, you know, about what you were feeling. And you realized you were wrong.” This made sense, at least. Jace had always been one to learn by doing. At the Bridgehampton house one summer he had eaten one of every plant in the garden because he wanted to figure out which ones were poisonous. Mother had nearly had a fit. And now Jace had done the same thing by kissing Alec. Just trying to figure out the consequences of an action, not really caring about it in and of itself.

“That’s not what I’m saying,” Jace says, exhaling dramatically. “I’m trying to figure out how you feel.”

“So you don’t regret it?” Alec asks.

“Jesus, I hate arguing with lawyers.”

“I’m not a lawyer,” Alec points out.

“More or less. But - you know what, that’s not the point. The point is -” Jace says, pushing his hair out of his eyes. He didn’t style his hair today, so blonde locks are falling all over the place. It’s really quite distracting.

“Right, what _is_ the point?” Alec interrupts.

Jace rubs his eyes. “The point is, we need to acknowledge that something happened, and it was weird and confusing, but it’s okay, we’re both fine, and we’re moving on.”

“Okay,” Alec says, feeling that little seed of hope that was trying to take root in his chest shrivel up and die. “Okay.”

“And it wasn’t fair to you. I’m sorry.”

Alec looks up at the ceiling, not wanting Jace to see what was shining in his eyes. _This was what you wanted, you idiot_ , he reminds himself. He had wanted everything to be okay. This was what things being okay looked like. “It’s fine. It wasn’t fair of me to...to feel what I felt towards you.”

Jace looks at him, and Alec can’t read the expression on his face. “I’m sorry that you thought I would be angry with you,” Jace says. “You have to know, there’s literally nothing you could do, nothing you could say to me, that would push me away. You’re stuck with me.” Alec realizes Jace’s mouth is doing that little half-tug smile he does when he wants to cry, and now Alec thinks _he_ might actually cry.

“I know,” Alec says. “You too. It was just...it was hard. But I don’t feel that way anymore.”

“You don’t?” Jace asks. Alec resents the tone of disbelief.

“No. Like you said, we’re acknowledging that it happened and leaving it in the past. It was stupid anyway. It didn’t even make sense.”

“Okay,” Jace says, his tone is light but Alec thinks he might actually be hurt. “Why didn’t it make sense?”

“Us? What about us _would_ make sense?” Alec says, trying to sound dismissive.

Jace nods slowly. “I know. You have a country to conquer, or whatever. You can’t do that with a murderer’s son by your side.”

“What?!” Alec gapes, genuinely shocked. “That is not what this is about at all.”

“C’mon Alec,” Jace says. There’s a weird look on his face, almost like he’s daring Alec, challenging him to disagree. “It’s okay. I know you could never be with someone like me.”

“Someone like you?” Alec repeats dumbly, lightly wondering if this whole thing could possibly be a fever dream. That was starting to feel like the only plausible explanation. “What does someone like you mean?”

Jace opens his arms, gesturing in exasperation. “I’m a piece of shit, Alec! You know that! What the fuck am I gonna do with my life? I have no plans, nothing waiting for me out there. No bright shiny future. The only thing I’m good at is fighting and, oh yeah, turns out I’m pretty fucking good at moving drugs. I have nothing. I _am_ nothing. So, yes. It doesn’t make sense for you to be with someone like -”

But Jace doesn’t have a chance to finish, because Alec has stood up and crossed the room in three long strides. Without thinking, without even fully realizing what he’s doing Alec puts his mouth on Jace’s, cutting him off. Jace is surprised, his lips frozen for a moment in the middle of his rant, but then he responds hungrily, kissing Alec back. Alec winds his fingers through Jace’s loose long hair and pulls his head back a little, so their faces are only just an inch apart. Jace is breathing hard.

“Don’t say that. Never say that.” Alec says passionately. Jace licks his lips, looking up at Alec. His eyes search Alec’s face, looking for permission, for absolution, for salvation. “You are everything,” Alec whispers against Jace’s lips.

His words seem to set something off in Jace. Jace slams their lips together roughly and Alec thinks he can taste blood in his mouth. But he doesn’t care. He wants to bleed for Jace, to let Jace consume him, cannibalize him. He would beg him for it. They’re stumbling backward, Jace steering them to the couch. He collapses on it and Jace is on top of him and Alec is pretty sure the helicopter must have gone down somewhere over New York because there’s no way this is real, no way they haven’t died. Whether they’re in heaven or hell remains to be seen, but frankly Alec doesn’t care.

Jace is straddling him, his hands under Alec’s shirt. He feels Jace’s fingers running down his spine and he shivers, which seems to thrill Jace. Jace drops his mouth to Alec’s neck, kissing his collarbone. Alec had never thought about his collarbone before, which is crazy because it’s clearly the most important part of his body. Jace runs his tongue across the crevice, licking his way up Alec’s neck. Alec arches his back, pushing himself against Jace. Jace leans back for a moment and yanks his own shirt off with both hands. Alec stares, genuinely dumbstruck by Jace’s body. He’s seen it so many times, obviously, stared at it covertly, but now it was here, in front of him. Jace was offering it to him.

Tentatively, Alec lifts a hand to Jace’s chest and runs a hand down his abs. It’s like touching marble. A groan escapes Alec before he can control himself, and, slowly, he raises his head and puts his mouth to Jace’s chest, kissing every inch of him. He runs the bridge of his nose up until he finds Jace’s lips again and he kisses him greedily now, still not confident this isn’t about to be snatched out from underneath him. This was stolen time, and he intended to steal as much of it as he could before it was revoked.

Jace’s hands are under his shirt now, and Jace guides it off over his head, pressing him back down to the couch. Bare skin to bare skin now, every nerve ending in Alec’s body is electrified. He’s never wanted anything so badly, there’s no word for what he’s feeling now. It surpassed desire, lust, love, even. It’s all consuming, and in the back of his mind, like a prayer, Alec hears himself think _It will kill me if you stop_.

But then Jace does stop. He pulls away from Alec’s lips, sitting back a little on his knees, still straddling Alec. “Hold on,” Jace says, breathing heavily.

Alec does not want to hold on. He wants Jace to flip him over and fuck him right there on the couch. He looks up at him, and there’s a blazing fire in Jace’s eyes. _This is the kind of look that drives men to war_ , Alec thinks.

“What?” Alec breathes, when Jace doesn’t return to his body, to him. “What’s wrong?” Alec feels like a drunk trying to sober up enough to remember how he got to the party. “Are you okay?” Alec asks, hearing the edge of panic in his voice.

“Yes,” Jace says. “God, yes.” Alec exhales in relief. “But we should talk about this. Before. If we’re going to keep going. We need to talk. Because I don’t think I’ll be able to stop if we start again.” Jace runs his fingers through his hair in an increasingly futile effort to keep it out of his face.

Alec drags his body up into a sitting position, knowing Jace is right, as much as he hates it. “Our track record for ‘talking about it’ does not bode well, but yes.”

Jace laughs, and before Alec realizes what he’s doing, Jace leans in and kisses him quickly on the lips. Somehow, that soft brush undoes him just as much as the deeper kisses. The casualness of it, the assumption of a kiss being freely wanted and given, is thrilling. The lightness of the kiss suggests a future. A future where there’s more kissing. Where things are soft and easy.

“You’re sure you want to do this?” Jace asks. “We can’t take it back.”

Alec nods. “I’m sure. You?”

Jace rests his hand on Alec’s chest, nodding fervently. “Yes. It’s strange,” he says, his breathing still ragged. “How right it feels. I thought it would be weird.”

Alec laughs, drunk on the moment. He places his hands on either of Jace’s arms, letting his fingers trace Jace’s skin. Now that he has permission to roam freely he feels like an explorer, duty bound to map every square inch of this body that was almost as familiar to him as his own yet was somehow brand new again. Jace lets Alec’s fingers roam everywhere for a minute, but then he catches both of Alec’s hands in his own. He holds them tight and presses his knees into Alec’s hips, and Alec feels a thrill of what’s to come, the anticipation of it aching in his body.

“C’mon,” Jace says, but he doesn’t move. He’s still holding Alec tightly.

“Where are we going?” Alec asks.

Jace still doesn’t move. He brings Alec’s hands to his mouth and kisses both of his palms. “You’ve always been the best part of me,” he whispers. Alec puts his lips to Jace’s again, kissing him deeply, taking his time. He knows now that there is time. Maybe all of the time in the world, if they were lucky. Maybe they had always been building towards this. Maybe the universe, seemingly so cruel and chaotic, actually had a plan. It must have, if it had brought them together, given them to each other.

“I want to belong to you,” Alec says.

 Jace stands, pulling him to his feet too. Jace takes his hand, guiding Alec into his bedroom. They both stand by the bed, and Jace hesitates, his eyes searching Alec’s again. Alec knows he’s giving him another chance to turn back, to stop this. Alec nods his head, running his thumb against Jace’s cheekbone. So, painstakingly slowly, Jace kneels down on the floor in front of him. Alec’s stomach drops out. Jace looks up at him solemnly as he carefully unbuttons Alec’s jeans.

"We belong to each other” Jace says. “We always have.”

***

When Alec wakes up, Jace is curled around him, his arm across Alec’s chest, hand resting on his shoulder. Holding Alec tightly against him, keeping him safe. He can feel Jace’s nose pressed against his shoulder blade, his steady breath warming Alec’s skin. It’s still dark, and disoriented by sleep and exhaustion, Alec stirs against Jace. He has to check that he’s still real. His body is there, his stubble rough against Alec’s back, the scent of sweat and sex lingering in the bed around them. And then, to his profound humiliation, Alec feels himself starting to cry. To be held like this by Jace was beyond even what he had dreamed of. Of course he had often fantasized about what it would be like to touch Jace, to kiss him and to know his body. And he had done those things. He remembers them, warmth spreading through his chest. But this was different. The tenderness of Jace’s embrace. The promise of togetherness. That was what moved him to tears now. The realization that things were not ruined; they were, in fact, only just beginning.

Jace, never far from consciousness, stirs behind him. “Hey,” he murmurs into Alec’s ear. “What’s wrong?” Alec rolls onto his back to look up at Jace, who’s propped himself up on an elbow. Alec knows his eyes are still full of tears, and Jace looks stricken. “Are you okay? Did I hurt you?”

“No, no,” Alec says quickly, wiping at his eyes. “Nothing like that.”

Jace is visibly relieved, and he gently runs his fingers through Alec’s hair. “You’re sure?”

“It’s just...I can’t believe this is real. You don’t know how long I wanted you, how I hated myself for it. I only hoped I would find a way to live with it. But I never believed you would want me too.”

Jace smiles. “Well, I’m sorry if no one’s pointed this out before, but you are rather attractive.”

Alec half smiles, but he has to press further, he has to know for sure. He rolls away from Jace, burying his face in a pillow.

“You do want this, right?” he asks the pillow in a whisper.

“I can’t hear you, babe” Jace says, and Alec can hear the smile in his voice. Alec lifts his head slightly, keeping his back to Jace and asks again. “You’re sure you actually do want this, I mean, want _me_ like this, right? You’re not just - just doing it because you feel bad or something? Or because it’s what I want?”

Jace’s voice sounds sad. “Oh, Al. Is it really so hard for you to believe someone would want you back? You’re the best person I know.” Alec looks away, blushing. “Yes. I promise you. It took me a little longer to see it than it took you. But once I saw it...now you’re all I see, Alec.” Alec keeps his head down, burrowing deeper into the pillow.

“Look at me, Alec,” Jace’s tone is suddenly serious, commanding. He obeys, turning over to face him.

“You’re it for me, man. You always have been.” Jace’s gaze is unflinching, scorching across Alec’s body.

“I love you,” Alec says without thinking. He and Jace had said they loved each other countless times, in countless ways. They had said it seriously, as brothers, partners in crime. They had said it lightly, when one of them handed over their homework to copy. They had said it sarcastically, mocking each other. They had said it over text, on the phone, in person, alone, in front of others, with Izzy. None of them had felt like this. Alec’s breath catches in his chest.

Jace moves slowly. He takes Alec’s hand and carefully interlaces their fingers. He seems to understand what Alec does. That the earth just moved. “I love you, too.”

And then he kisses Alec. It’s different from last night. Different from the way they had kissed at St. Bartholomew’s. Their hungry passion was replaced with something softer. Something more mature and serious and vulnerable. Jace kisses him softly, his lips parted and lingering. Jace kissed him like he knew Alec was his.

Jace lays down on his back again. Alec’s head is swimming a little. “I could get used to this,” Jace says, smiling.

Alec puts his head down on Jace’s arm, brushing his nose against Jace’s skin, breathing him in. Jace starts to run his fingers through Alec’s hair, twisting his curls gently. Alec wonders if his skull fracture is acting up or if the out of body sensation he’s experiencing is just the product of pure happiness. He’s okay with it either way, as long as Jace keeps his fingers in his hair.

“Want to know what I’m scared of?” Jace says after a few moments of perfect togetherness.

Alec is surprised. Jace didn’t readily admit to being scared of things. But they were in a brave new world together. “Tell me,” he says into Jace’s chest.

“I’m scared of fucking this up. I’m not good at relationships. But this is - this is everything. If I mess things up between us…”

“I get it. I’m scared too. But I _know_ you Jace. And you know me. We didn’t plan this, but I think this is where we were meant to end up. And we’ll just figure the rest out as we go. One day at a time.”

Jace kisses the top of his head. “Yeah. Plus I think Izzy’ll keep both of us from being too big of idiots about anything.”

Alec laughs. “I guess we should probably tell Izzy about this.”

“I have a sneaking suspicion she already knows.”

“She might actually be psychic,” Alec agrees.

“I think she just knows us better than we know ourselves,” Jace says.

“I suppose we’ll have to tell my parents,” Alec says. That’ll be…”

“Interesting?” Jace suggests. “One thing at a time, right? We’re figuring it out as we go. It’s going to be hard. But all the best things are.”

Alec nods, then leans up to kiss Jace again, just to prove to himself that he can. Lingering against his lips, Alec breathes, “I’m sorry I woke you.”

“I was never asleep,” Jace says, kissing him again.

“Liar,” Alec says, putting his hand flat on Jace’s chest, running his thumb over a nipple.

“Can’t prove it,” Jace says, wrapping his hand into Alec’s hair at the nape of his neck.

“Well now that we’re up…” Alec starts, but he can’t finish because Jace is kissing him again, pushing him back down onto the bed, and Alec lets Jace carry him away.


	4. Grace

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> epilogue! the end! 
> 
> i really loved writing this and so appreciate everyone's comments, thanks so much for reading and i hope you like the end!

**Jace, 36**

“Remind me to never be pregnant in August again, please,” Izzy says, resting her feet on the bench. At eight and a half months, Izzy is ready to burst, but of course still manages to look impeccable. “My ankles are the size of grapefruits,” she continues.

 “I’ll make a note of that,” Jace says with a laugh. “Do you want something else to eat?” He gestures at the picnic table, which is literally packed with food. “More potato salad? Fruit? Pickles? Pregnant women love pickles.”

 “This pregnant woman is going to cut you if you offer me a pickle one more time,” Izzy says, pointing a hot dog at Jace accusingly. “Don’t worry, your baby is getting plenty to eat. Besides, there has to be some food left when the guests arrive.”

 “I don’t actually think that’s going to be a problem,” Jace says, gesturing at the table. He goes to crouch down by Izzy on the grass. “He doing okay in there?” he asks, resting a hand on her enormous stomach. He still finds it difficult to believe that he and Alec’s child is currently residing just under Izzy’s skin.

 “Great,” she says. He kisses her belly, then kisses Izzy on the forehead.

 “Nooooo that’s mine! Give it back!” The sound of Clarissa’s voice wafts over from the pool. She’s definitely on the verge of a tantrum. Then there’s some splashing and the unmistakable sound of toddlers crying.

“Uh oh,” Jace says. “The party hasn’t even started yet, don’t they know it’s too early for tantrums?”

Izzy laughs as she heaves herself up as well. “I think you’ll find it’s always the right time for a tantrum if you’re four,” she says, following Jace over to the pool.

“Clary, baby, what happened?” Jace says, kneeling down at the edge of the pool.

Peter, Izzy’s delightfully long-suffering husband, is trying to soothe their crying son Max and the very grumpy Clarissa at the same time.

“He took Dinosaur!” Clarissa cries, splashing her water wings around mournfully. Jace bends and scoops his daughter out of the pool, holding her to him and soaking his shirt.

“I thought you were going to share Dinosaur with your cousin,” Jace says. “Remember how we share?”

“Well now no one gets the dinosaur,” Peter says, handing Max up to Izzy. “Because Max has thrown it in the deep end.”

“Nooooo, I want it! It’s mine!” Clarissa cries, her tiny body overwhelmed by the injustice.

“I bet if you ask really nicely Uncle Peter will go get it for you,” Jace says, kissing the tears of frustration from her cheeks.

“Uncle Petuhhhh can you get Dinosaur?” Clary immediately stops crying, knowing the cuter she looks the better this will go.

“Well you asked so nicely, of course I can,” Peter says, swimming off to the deep end to retrieve the offending plastic figurine.

“Clary, why don’t you apologize to Max?” Jace asks. Clarissa glares at him, apparently offended that he would ask her to degrade herself like this. At four years old, she’s finally growing into her massive brown eyes, but she can still destroy Jace with a single pouting look. And Lord does she know it.

She’s still considering it when Alec calls to him out the kitchen window. “Babe, can you come get Celina?”

“Uh oh,” Izzy says. “We’re going to run out of hands soon. Go help Al, I got this.” Jace hands off Clary to her and Izzy balances a toddler on each hip, her massive belly between them. Jace laughs at her. “Don’t you dare,” Izzy scolds him. “You can’t be rude to me while I’m carrying your son.”

Jace crosses the expansive grassy slope that leads to their house. He and Izzy had done a pretty thorough job setting up the backyard before Izzy decided her feet hurt and she needed to eat a hot dog at that EXACT moment or she was going to die. Now they were just waiting for the guests to arrive for Alec’s birthday barbeque.

Jace slides the glass door open, stepping with relief into the air conditioning. They’d bought the sprawling home in Hollywood Hills shortly after the wedding. Part of the appeal, besides the views and the pool, was that Izzy and Peter’s house was in walking distance (or a three minute drive, if you had a particularly fussy toddler). He pops his head in the kitchen, where, improbably, even more food is spread over the white marble countertops. Alec is chopping tomatoes with one hand and holding Celina, Clarissa’s twin, with the other.

He comes up behind them, snaking his hand around Alec’s waist and kissing him on the cheek. “Look at Dad of the Year in here,” he teases.

Alec smiles at him, passing off Celina. “Just need to finish making the salad, but someone was getting too rough with poor old Persy.”

“Oh no, was that you?” Jace coos, kissing Celina.

“Papa!” she yelps, as if she hadn’t seen him mere minutes before. Persephone, who by their best guess has to be about eighteen at this point, sits meowing grumpily on a chair nearby.

“Hi baby,” he laughs, kissing Celina again. “Were you being nice to the cat?”

“I didn’ pull her tail on purpose,” Celina explains. “She just moved.”

“Persephone is very old, so you have to be gentle with her. Just like Daddy,” Jace says, carrying Celina over to the cat.

“Rude,” Alec yelps.

“Let’s try petting her really softly,” Jace says, lowing Celina to the cat’s height. Celina stiffly pats Persephone on the head a few times. “Perfect,” Jace says. “See how much nicer that is?” Persephone, who had survived numerous moves and the intrusion of two children in her life, endures this indignity with grace before deciding she’s had enough and jumping off the chair to slink upstairs. Izzy was very self righteous about the fact that her surprise cat had been such a staple in their lives, and Alec and Jace had long since given up pretending they didn’t adore her.

Satisfied that this was at least a moderately successful teachable moment, Jace carries Celina back to Alec, who’s still chopping.

“Cellie, let’s tell Daddy that other people let someone else do the cooking when it’s their birthday,” Jace says, bouncing Celina on his hip while she snuggles her head on his shoulder. Clarissa was wildly independent, insisting on walking everywhere and dressing herself every morning, but all Celina ever wanted was to be held. She was the sweetest thing he’d ever known. Secretly, he hoped Celina never grew out of it, that she would never stop running to her dads for hugs every fifteen minutes. But he knew she would. She’d be a teenager one day, and wasn’t that a terrifying thought. He was going to start training the girls as soon as Alec deemed them old enough (this age range of “appropriate” vacillated between eight and fourteen, depending on which of them was winning the argument). Either way, he’d make sure they were fully equipped to be teenage girls out in the world.

Alec smiles, waving him off. “I like cooking. Plus how will I make sure everything is good enough for my birthday unless I make it myself?”

Jace laughs. He knows they’re getting older, what with becoming parents and owning a home and the way his left shoulder creaks all the time, but he thinks the surest indicator of time passing is the change in how they celebrated birthdays. At some point they transitioned from huge parties and lavish travel to backyard barbeques with parents from the twins’ preschool and attorneys from Alec’s firm. Jace didn’t mind the change.

“Why was Clary crying?” Alec asks.

Jace swipes a tomato from Alec’s cutting board and feeds it to Celina. “A heated dispute with Max over Dinosaur, the dinosaur.”

“Classic. By the way, I was thinking we should order two or three more of Dinosaur, just in case he disappears one day. She’s gotten so attached to him.”

“Good thinking,” Jace says. “Celina, do you know how smart Daddy is?”

“Yah,” Celina says, uninterested.

“You know what I was thinking we need?” Jace says.

“Oh no,” Alec says, “that sounds like it’s going to be expensive.”

Jace shrugs. “What’s the point of having a fancy high power lawyer husband if he’s not going to buy me a leather couch?”

“You want a _leather couch_?” Alec demands. “We have two four year olds, are you insane?”

“No,” Jace laughs. “I’m kidding. But I do think we should get the girls a dog.”

“Absolutely not,” Alec says. “We’re about to have another baby! And I think poor Persy would actually die from shock.”

“It would be so sweet though! And it’s good to grow up with a dog, it teaches responsibility. You want a dog, don’t you, Celina?”

“Yeah!” Celina says. “Doggie doggie doggie doggie!” She continues her chant without appearing to draw breath.

“Okay, well thanks for that,” Alec says.

“Now you have to do it,” Jace says. “Look how excited she is.” Celina’s continued “doggie” refrain is interrupted by the doorbell. “Time for you to be the birthday boy,” Jace says, throwing Alec a dish towel. “Come greet your guests.”

“I wanna go back to Daddy,” Celina announces.

“Wow, tough break for Papa,” Jace says with a laugh, handing their daughter back to Alec.

Alec goes to let their guests in, but Jace grabs his arm. “Hey,” he says. Alec turns back to him, smiling. Jace never really got used to how beautiful Alec was. “Happy Birthday baby.” Alec kisses him sweetly. Jace also never really got used to how much he loved Alec.

***

The backyard is packed with people, and despite Alec’s concerns there does indeed seem to be enough food. Jace looks down on the scene from the upstairs bathroom window; Max had stubbed his toe and they’d needed to do a full survey of the available Band-Aids.

“Okay buddy, we good?” Jace says, scooping Max up once he’s selected a Thomas the Tank Engine design. Max says something wildly incoherent, but he seems happy so Jace agrees with him. Max’s vocabulary was pretty good for a two year old, but things occasionally got muddled. Jace made a mental note to spend more time on the picture word books with him this week.

“Let’s go back to the party,” Jace says to Max, who sticks out his foot to show Jace his toe again. “I know, that hurt didn’t it?”

Max nods solemnly and Jace carries him downstairs. He loved when the house was full like this, packed to the rafters with people he loved. He liked the noise, the chaos, the enthusiasm. Toys underfoot and children laughing and someone’s new baby to admire. It was the opposite of growing up an only child, following Michael from town to town. He shifts Max’s weight. He rarely thought about Michael these days. Before the twins were born he’d been paranoid, obsessively arming himself with parenting knowledge in an increasingly deranged mission to prepare.

He remembers how Alec had found him in the den one night at 3AM, sitting on the floor crying into _What to Expect When You’re Expecting_. In traditional Alec fashion, he hadn’t said anything, just had joined him down there, sitting cross-legged in his pajama pants and taking Jace’s hand.

He’d let them sit in silence for a moment and then gently shut the book, putting it behind him. “Tell me,” he said, stroking Jace’s hand with his thumb.

“I don’t know if I can do it,” Jace had whispered.

“Which part?”

“All of it,” Jace said miserably. “They’re too fragile, it’s too scary. I just...I shouldn’t be trusted with one baby, let alone two.”

“Jace,” Alec had said, putting his hand to the side of Jace’s face, forcing him to look at him. “You’re not Michael. You’re not going to hurt our children.” Jace had shaken his head. He knew himself, of course, but he also had once thought he’d known his father. Alec had let him cry, and then he had taken both of his hands in his. “Our daughters are going to be so lucky to have you as a father. I’ve never been so sure of anything.”

“Don’t let me fuck it up,” Jace had said.

“Only if you promise to help me not fuck up,” Alec said earnestly. “I’m scared, too. But we’re here. We’re together. And we’re not them.”

Alec had banned parenting books after that, and had forced Jace instead to read a book called _Adult Children of Abusive Parents_. There was a chapter on having children, and how violence didn’t have to be inherited. It had helped.

Back in the foyer, the doorbell rings again, so Jace takes Max to answer the front door. “Grandma!” yells Max, reaching for Maryse.

“Hi Maryse,” Jace says, kissing her cheek while she coos over Max.

Maryse is as beautiful as ever, her gray hair only making her appear more regal. She’s wearing a sleek black dress, which is of course Maryse’s idea of the appropriate outfit for a casual summer barbeque.

“Love the dress,” he says as he hands Max to her. “That one of Izzy’s?”

“Of course,” Maryse says sternly. “I wouldn’t be caught dead in anything else.”

Jace laughs. Maryse lived primarily in the New York apartment since she had divorced Robert ten years ago, but she kept a place in LA as well so she could be near her grandchildren. She’d been living out here for the past few weeks to help all of them as they prepared for the new baby.

From his back pocket, Jace’s phone rings. It’s Andy, his second in command at the boxing gym. “I better take this,” he tells Maryse. “Everyone’s out back, I’ll be right there.”

Max has already launched into a long, albeit slightly garbled, narrative for his grandmother, so Maryse just smiles at Jace and heads for the backyard.

“Hey Andy,” Jace says into the phone. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah man, sorry to bug you.” Andy was a good kid and a good fighter. But Jace had given him the manager position because of the story he’d told about why he learned to box. The only black student in his suburban high school, Andy got used to throwing punches at racist kids, but kept hurting his knuckles. His parents figured if he was going to do this much punching he might as well have good form. Jace had taken to him instantly.

“No problem,” Jace says.

“I had three new girls in our afternoon self-defense class,” Andy explains, “but the printer isn’t working so I can’t have them pay or do any paperwork?”

“Tell them not to worry about paying and we’ll get it sorted out next time. Just write down their names,” Jace says. He offered a wide range of classes at the gym but self-defense was by far his favorite to teach. He liked helping people feel safe.

“Thanks boss. Say happy birthday to Alec for me,” Andy says.

“Will do. See ya tomorrow.”

Jace rejoins the party, scanning the crowd for Alec and the girls. He passes Izzy, who’s talking very seriously with a teenage girl. He catches a snippet of their conversation and realizes Izzy is letting the girl show her some of her sketches and encouraging her to pursue a fashion career. Jace smiles, nodding at Izzy.  

“Excuse me,” says an older woman. “Do you know if there are any more towels?”

“Sure,” Jace says. “I’ll grab you one.”

“Thanks dear,” she says.

He grabs one from the pool house and brings it back to her. “It’s a very nice party, don’t you think?”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Jace says, smiling. He offers her the towel.

“Do you know the gentleman whose birthday it is?”

“Uh,” Jace starts.

“I heard he married his brother,” she continues before Jace can explain that he knows the birthday boy rather intimately. “Doesn’t that just seem scandalous?”

“It’s true,” Izzy says from over Jace’s shoulder. She must have abandoned her aspiring designer friend when she heard things going south over here. “He did marry his brother. And now their sister is pregnant with their child,” she says, putting her arm around Jace and pointing at her enormous belly. “Isn’t that just the worst thing you ever heard?”

The woman looks from Izzy to Jace to Izzy’s belly, putting two and two together. “Oh, uh, excuse me,” she mumbles as she bustles away.

“As much as you love it, please try to avoid scandalizing our guests,” Jace says, trying and failing to sound stern.

“Whatever. She needs a bit of scandal in her life.” Izzy says, leaning against Jace. Izzy did genuinely think it was hilarious that she was pregnant with her brother’s child (despite the fact that her non-biological sibling was the biological father of the children) and told strangers at every possible opportunity.

“I appreciate you coming to joust for our honor,” Jace says.

“Oh dear,” says Peter, joining them by the side of the pool. “Who’s Izzy scandalized now?”

“Some rude old bitch,” Izzy shrugs.

“Love, you don’t always need to make a scene,” Peter says.

“Um, yes I do. Have you seen me?” Izzy says, gesturing at herself.

“Good point,” Peter says.

Jace just laughs. They had withstood far worse comments when they started openly being together. In their last year at Harvard they had kept it relatively quiet, letting only some trusted friends in on their changing relationship. Surprisingly, most people had been far less thrown by it than they’d anticipated. They got several, “Wait, you guys weren’t sleeping together before?” comments, and most people simply hadn’t cared. There were exceptions of course, Robert being the most notable. He’d threatened to disown Alec; they’d been prepared for it of course, but it didn’t make it any easier for Alec to handle. Izzy had stopped speaking to Robert, telling him only that he was welcome to write Jace and Alec out of his will, but she would give them each a third of everything she had for the rest of her life to ensure his efforts would be futile. Once all his children had stopped speaking to him and he and Maryse had separated, it seemed to have finally sunk in that perhaps he himself was the problem. They’d rebuilt the framework of a relationship over the years; he called them from time to time and had met the grandchildren. But none of them let him spend enough time with Clary, Celina or Max to really shape them. They wouldn’t let another generation inherit his hard heart.

“Speaking of your brother who did not impregnate you,” Jace says, “where is Al?”

“He was showing some kids the treehouse last I saw him,” Peter says.

Izzy cocks her head at Jace. “Didn’t you have my son?”

“Your mom’s here. He’s with her,” Jace laughs.

“See this is why you’re the one in charge of our children,” Peter says. “Really dismal display of parental supervision on our end.”

“Let’s go find Maryse,” Izzy says, taking Peter’s hand.

“And perhaps our son!” Peter says jokingly to Jace as Izzy steers him away.

Jace laughs, heading towards the treehouse to look for Alec. He truly had never envisioned a world where he was the primary stay at home parent,  but now he can’t imagine doing anything else. He runs his gym of course, but every morning after Peter dropped off Max it was just Jace and the kids. He’d spent so long being anxious about being a father he hadn’t really realized how fun it would be. All the moms at the preschool loved him, which Alec had rudely pointed out probably had more to do with Jace’s appearance than the number of volunteer shifts he took at the drive through drop off.

He finally finds Alec just past the treehouse, engaged in a passionate debate with some of his law school friends. Jace has no idea what they’re talking about as he walks up to their circle, but Alec is clearly enjoying himself. UCLA hadn’t been Al’s first choice for law school, and honestly he’d gotten into better schools, but they’d both fallen in love with the idea of coming to Los Angeles. It felt like a fresh start, a new city where nobody knew them as family, far from DC and politics and the past. They could introduce themselves as a couple there, establish a whole new life. And of course Izzy had followed them out here as soon as she could.

“There’s Jace!” Alec says, lighting up when he sees him. “We were looking for you.”

“I was looking for you,” Jace says, joining their circle.

Alec grins and kisses him. “Well that worked out nicely then, didn’t it?”

“You know, it really did,” Jace says, standing arm in arm with Alec. “I hate to break up what is clearly a spirited discussion, but it’s time for cake.”

“No, it’s good you’re showed up,” Lydia says. “Alec is so comically wrong about this bioethics case I was going to have to humiliate him at his own birthday party.”

Everyone, including Alec, laughs. “It’s nice that you still come all this way to celebrate my birthday and by celebrate my birthday I mean make wildly unsubstantiated claims about genome sequencing.”

“Oh my god Alec you have to admit - “ Lydia starts.

“We’re done! I’m following Jace to cake!” another of their friends chimes in.

They dissolve into good natured bickering amongst themselves. Jace leads Alec away, walking arm and arm back to the picnic tables. “I’m right by the way,” Alec whispers in Jace’s ear. “Her theory gives way too much power to pharmaceutical corporations, it’ll never stand.”

“I know you are,” Jace says soothingly.

“Also,” Alec starts. He grabs Jace’s hand and pulls him behind the pool house. “Mark told me they’re voting this week on offering me a partnership. He said it looks really good, and he thinks I could have the offer by the end of the month.”

“Al! Are you serious?! That’s amazing!” Jace hugs him tightly. “I’m so proud of you.”

“It’s not official yet, obviously, he shouldn’t have even told me.” Alec says, hesitant as always to give himself any credit. “I might not have the votes.”

Jace grabs his shoulders. “No way. You’re gonna be a partner. You deserve it.” He kisses Alec deeply and they let themselves forget about the party for a moment.

Alec finally breaks away. “I suppose we have to go be good hosts, don’t we?” he says, keeping his hand against Jace’s face.

Jace kisses his palm. “Now, yes. Later, though…”

“Later is good,” Alec says, kissing Jace again quickly.

They finally wrangle all of their guests and Jace brings out the cake (which is, of course, Funfetti). Clary and Cellie help him blow out the candles and then Peter oversees the actual cutting and distribution of cake, which is no small task when eighteen children and their equally interested parents realize cake is on the line.

Privately, Alec and Jace had always been highly skeptical that there was a human man out there who deserved to be married to Izzy. She had high standards of course, and certainly didn’t want or need their input, so they mostly kept their opinions to themselves. (They had almost broken this rule several times during the very stressful two year period where Izzy dated a drummer, but fortunately she had ended that before they had to stage an intervention). They had all taken to Peter quite quickly though, particularly when, after a few months of dating, Izzy had explained their family structure and announced her plan to have her brothers’ first child within the next year, to which Peter had simply replied “Cool.” He’d met Izzy while she was in his native London for Fashion Week. The legend of their meet up was that he had seen her at a party and decided to introduce himself and ask her out. She politely declined by telling him to go fuck himself, which he responded to by promptly falling madly in love with her. When they ran into each other again a few weeks later in New York, Izzy decided fate was trying to tell her something and had asked him out. The rest was history.

“Family photo time!” Lydia announces. “I’m documenting this. Everyone huddle up.”

Peter and Izzy track down Max, and they join Alec and Jace and the girls and Maryse on the lawn for a photo. Lydia takes it. In the photo, Jace is laughing. Alec is looking at Clary, who holds a massive handful of cake. Maryse holds Max as he reaches for Celina, who has a rather stunning amount of frosting in her hair. Peter is looking at Izzy, who has one hand around Alec and one on her pregnant belly. Jace thinks it’s the best picture anyone’s ever taken.  

***

By the time they finally shove the last few stragglers out the door, Jace is exhausted. Maryse helps them clean up from the party, but there’s still baths for the girls and bedtime insurrections to contend with. They’re hyped up from a day of sun and sugar and school friends, so even once he’s gotten them into bed, an extra long storytime is required. But finally both girls drift off, their dark curls, so like Alec’s, still damp on their pillows.

He finds Alec in their bedroom, working on his laptop in bed. Jace throws himself down on the bed dramatically.

“Girls asleep?” Alec asks, shutting his laptop.

“Finally, yes,” Jace says, burrowing into Alec’s side and throwing an arm over him. “We had to read _Good Dog Carl_ four times.”

Alec runs his fingers through Jace’s hair. “That’s a lot of Carl.”

“I think Celina’s last molar is finally coming in,” Jace says, his face still buried in Alec’s chest.

“Oh good. Their dentist will be happy. Is it hurting her?”

“She said it hurts to chew. I may or may not have promised she can have ice cream for dinner tomorrow night?”

Alec laughs. “Wow, things were getting dire in there.”

Jace lifts his head, resting his chin on Alec’s chest. “Oh, the bribes were flowing.”

“You didn’t promise them a dog, did you?” Alec laughs.

“Uhhh.”

“Jace!”

“I’m kidding,” Jace laughs. “No animals were included in the bartering.”

Alec shakes his head at him. Jace touches his husband’s cheek. “Did you have a good birthday?”

“Yes,” Alec says, “wonderful. Thank you for everything.”

“Hey, remember how my husband is about to get partner at the biggest law firm in the world?” Jace says.

Alec scrunches up his face. “Do you really think they’ll do it?”

“I do,” Jace says, raising himself up on his elbows to kiss Alec. “I really do.”

Alec pushes him over onto his back, climbing on top of him as he continues the kiss.

“You know what my favorite birthday was?” Alec asks, his head bent over Jace.

“Was it when I proposed to you in Paris on your 30th?” Jace says, butting his nose against Alec’s.

“No,” says Alec. “Although that wasn’t too bad.”

“Thanks,” Jace laughs.

“It was that terrible summer. When you broke me out of the hospital and took me to St. Bartholomew's. The first time you ever kissed me.” Alec’s eyes are serious, looking down on Jace intently.

“Oh God,” Jace says, wrapping his arms around Alec. “We were so young. So dumb.”

“We were. But that was the best birthday present anyone’s ever given me.”

Jace kisses him again, his hands sliding under Alec’s shirt.

Alec’s phone rings. He sits back on his heels. “Don’t move,” he says to Jace.

“Never.”

Alec looks at his phone, still ringing. “It’s Peter.” They exchange a look. “You don’t think…”

“Answer it,” Jace says, suddenly breathless.

“Hi,” Alec says into the phone, putting it on speaker.

“Hope you’re willing to share a birthday with your son,” Peter says, excitement clear even through the crackling iPhone. “Izzy’s going into labor.”

“Oh my God,” Alec says.

Jace claps a hand over his mouth.

“Oh my God,” Alec repeats. He grabs for Jace, holding the phone in one hand and squeezing Jace’s hand tightly with the other.

“Maryse was here, so she’s bringing Max over to your place to stay with the girls. Meet us at the the hospital?”

“Of course. Okay,” Alec says at the same time that Jace says, “Oh my God.”

“How’s Izzy?” Alec asks.

“Hold on,” Peter says. They hear him call out, “Iz, love, the boys want to know how you are?”

“Fuck both of them,” Izzy calls back.

“She’s having a contraction. Ask her again in 60 seconds,” Peter says, trying not to laugh.

“Hang in there,” Jace says into the phone.

“No, no, I’m fine.” Izzy sounds like she’s come closer to the phone now. “Sorry it’s two weeks early guys.”

“Oh my God, Izzy, are you kidding?” Alec screeches into the phone.

“I just want to do a good job with your baby!” Izzy says.

“You’re perfect,” Jace says.

“Okay we’re getting in the car. Maryse should be almost to you,” Peter says. Then, slightly muffled, he sighs, “Izzy no, you do not need that many clothes, go put one suitcase back.”

Izzy groans in the background. Jace and Alec laugh.

“See you guys in a minute,” Peter says. “Congratulations!”

Everything happens very fast after that. Maryse arrives with the sleeping Max in tow and they promise to call her with every update. Jace and Alec jump in the car, Alec driving because Jace thinks he’s too emotional to be trusted with spatial relations right now. They keep glancing at each other in the car ride over, breaking out in grins and excited laughter.

As they walk into the hospital, gripping each other’s hands tightly, Alec asks, “Ready to do this again?”

“So ready,” Jace says. “Plus there’s only one this time! It’s going to seem so easy.”

“We still have the first two,” Alec reminds him.

“Oh shit,” Jace jokes. “Never mind, I’m not ready.”

Alec kisses him as the elevator doors close.

Izzy is already installed in a room, looking like she could either give birth or walk the runway, it was all the same to her. There’s a lot of chaotic kissing and hugging while Peter updates them. Izzy’s only at four centimeters, so they still have some time.

All three of them pull up chairs, sitting at her bedside.

“How do you feel, babe?” Jace asks.

“Fine, honestly,” Izzy says, seeming unconcerned. “Easier than the twins, that’s for sure.”

“Sorry we accidentally made you carry twins on your first pregnancy,” Alec laughs.

“It’s okay, it really broke things open down there,” Izzy says good-naturedly.

“That’s my girl,” Peter says.

A nurse comes in to check on Izzy’s vitals.

“Hi all!” She says cheerfully. “Just here to see how we’re doing.”

“God _fucking_ dammit,” Izzy says.

“What?” All three of them yell.

“Contraction,” Izzy groans. “Ugh fuck! Goddammit!” She keeps up a steady stream of cursing under her breath.

“It seems like they’re getting worse,” Peter helpfully tells the nurse.

“Yes they’re getting worse, you motherfucker,” Izzy yelps.

The nurse looks rather scandalized.

“Don’t mind her,” Alec says cheerfully.

“You’re up to six centimeters,” she says, surveying the three of them. “Are you the husband?” she asks Peter.

“Yes,” he says.

“I’m the father of the baby,” Jace says.

“I’m her brother,” Alec adds.

“I’m also her brother,” Jace says. “And his husband.”

The nurse tries to process all of this, and then seems to decide it’s too complicated. “Okay. Well generally we only have the husband in the room during labor…”

“It’s fine,” Izzy says. “Dr. Hamid is familiar with the situation. All three of them should be here.”

The nurse shrugs. “I’ll send Dr. Hamid in to check on you,” she says as she leaves again.

“Ooof,” Izzy says. “That was a bad one. Sorry I called you a motherfucker, baby,” she tells Peter.

He waves her off, and she leans back against the pillows. “Can you guys please distract me,” she groans.

“Did you know that during the birth process, a hormone is released that makes you forget how painful labor is so you’re willing to do it again?” Peter says. “From an evolutionary perspective, it’s really remarkably clever.”

“How is that helpful?!” Izzy demands. “I’m going to remember this, don’t you fucking worry about that. None of you are ever getting me pregnant again,” she groans.

“I thought we were going to have another kid next year,” Peter says.

“Nope,” Izzy moans. “All kids are canceled until further notice.”

“She’ll change her mind once that hormone kicks in,” Peter stage whispers to Jace and Alec.

“Ughhh, fuck all of you.”

“I’ve never gotten you pregnant,” Alec points out.

“Don’t care. You’re all dead to me.”

“Sorry,” Jace and Peter say in unison.

“It’s fine, I’m fine,” Izzy mutters, like she’s trying to convince herself. “At least I have a higher pain tolerance than Alec.”

“What?” Alec yelps.

“Remember when you did our tattoos,” Jace laughs. “I thought Alec was gonna pass out.”

“That is _not_ what happened,” Alec says stubbornly.

“In retrospect, perhaps we should have considered the possibility that we’d eventually get married before we tattooed ‘brothers forever’ on our bodies,” Jace laughs. The tattoos were some what faded now, the letters blurring into each other. (They had, after all, been stick and pokes done by a drunk teenage girl). But Jace loved his. He didn’t care that the tattoos misidentified their relationship. They were part of their journey. Part of the process of becoming each other’s whole worlds. They had been strangers, friends, brothers, best friends, roommates, boyfriends, husbands, and everything in between. And he had loved all of it.

“Yeah, whose idea was that?” Alec says.

“Yours!” Jace and Izzy say in unison. Peter roars with laughter.

“Which, speaking of retrospect,” Izzy says, pointing at Jace and Alec. “That was super gay.”

“Listen, we were working on it,” Jace says.

“Alec did almost faint though,” Izzy says. “Jace barely reacted.”

“It wasn’t as bad as the year before that, when you stitched up a literal head wound for me,” Jace says.

“I’m sorry,” Peter interrupts. “What?”

“I got in a fight and split my head, and Izzy just sewed it up,” Jace laughs.

“Why were you guys _never_ supervised?!” Peter demands.

“Great question,” Alec says. “It’s honestly a miracle we didn’t get into more trouble.”

“I think we got into plenty of trouble,” Izzy says shaking her head.

They ride out her next few contractions telling Peter increasingly ridiculous stories about their teenage years. They’ve told him most of these stories before, of course, but Peter reacts appropriately and it seems to keep Izzy’s mind busy.

Finally, Dr. Hamid comes in, shaking hands with all of them. “Who wants to have a baby?” he asks cheerfully. Peter and Jace sit at Izzy’s feet giving updates while Izzy squeezes all the blood out of Alec’s hand.

And then, just like that, there’s a baby boy. 10 inches long, 7.3 pounds, screaming and healthy and alive. Dr. Hamid offers him to Izzy, but she points at Jace, and then the doctor puts his son in his arms. He holds him, so improbably tiny and perfect, with a shock of dark hair.

“Hi baby,” he whispers.

Alec takes a shuddering, tearful breath as Jace hands him to Alec.

“You did it, Iz,” Peter says kissing his wife on the forehead.

“Thank you,” Alec says fervently.

“Oh,” Izzy says, laying back on the pillow and wiping her eyes. “Anytime, no problem.”

Jace is still staring at the tiny thing that is his son. He had a son. He opens his mouth to try and thank Izzy as well, but he can’t talk over the weight on his chest. One of the nurses takes their son back to clean him up, and Jace lets himself fall into Alec’s arms. Alec hugs him tightly, kissing him. “Congratulations,” Alec says. They’re both crying.

“Will you tell us the name yet?” Izzy demands.

Jace and Alec break apart, keeping their arms around each other. The nurse hands him back a their baby, now magically clean and swaddled.

“James,” Alec says.

“His name is James,” Jace repeats, holding his little body tightly. “James Bartholomew Lightwood.”

“Awww,” Izzy says. “You guys!”

“It’s perfect,” Peter says. “Congratulations.”

Jace looks down at James, his tiny fists screwed up as he laments the indignity of being born. Alec lowers his head to James’s forehead and kisses him softly. Jace remembers the night he had suggested the name Bartholomew. It was too much for a first name, but he thought it would be perfect as a middle name.

Alec had looked at him strangely. “Are you sure?” he’d asked.

They were in Mexico; they’d gone for a long weekend, just the two of them, shortly after they found out they were having a boy. They’d left the girls with Izzy and Peter, who insisted they have a romantic weekend away before they became parents again.

Sitting on the beach watching the sunset, Jace had been struck with how perfect the name was. “Yes,” Jace had said. “I’m sure.”

“It’s an important place for us,” Alec said, taking Jace’s hand.

“Yes, it is. And it’s important for you. For everything you believe in.”

Alec had bit his lip, and Jace could tell how much he loved the name. But Alec, careful as always, had needed to make sure. “Is it as meaningful to you too, though?” he’d asked.

“You know,” Jace said slowly. “I don’t believe in God. But I believe in you. I’ve always believed in you. And I realized a long time ago that was the same thing.”

And now they were here, holding James Bartholomew, marveling at the perfection of his tiny fingernails, his hair, his perfect little nose.

“I love you,” Jace says seriously to Alec.

Alec smiles, tears still shining in his eyes. “I’ve always loved you.”  

THE END

 


	5. Salt

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i know i said i was finished with this but i felt like i never gave izzy closure so it had to be done (plus why would i write all the things i needed to write for work when i could write this instead...)

_Izzy, 19_

Izzy is sprawled on her bed, laying on her stomach and flipping through the syllabus for “ _Let Them Eat Cake: Culture and Fashion During the French Revolution_ ”.  She’d already worked through to the third week’s reading, and was debating if getting further ahead would make the class boring. Unlikely. Although it probably wouldn’t make her any friends in class. Whatever. It wasn’t her fault this all came so easily to her.

 Izzy wasn’t taking any politics classes this semester, thank fucking God. She’d taken a polisci seminar freshman year as a sort of final concession to her last name, but now she was done with that. She barely wanted her last name anymore. Not after what it had done to Alec this summer, and to Jace.

 She abandons the syllabus and rolls over to her back, starting at the ceiling of the sorority house. The sun had set, but the day’s humidity still hung in the air. September in Nashville was a fucking nightmare. It was strange to be back. The city had made so much sense to her last year. But now the shadow of what Jace had experienced here this summer lingered over it, a shadow so profoundly removed from her world of frat parties and research papers and Socratic seminars it was hard to believe it had happened in the same zip code.

 She’d liberated Alec’s poor BMW, which had been commandeered and then abandoned by Jace in front of Michael’s house. It had still been parked there the day she’d shown up with a spare set of keys. The house wasn’t what she expected. Although of course she couldn’t say exactly what she had been expecting. Something besides the utterly banal, beige suburban A-frame, she guessed. It looked like every other house on the block. Nothing about it indicated a murderer lived there. Izzy had stood in front of that house for too long, almost wishing that someone would see her. That Michael, or that fucking Lyle guy, would come out and challenge her, demand to know what she was doing there and who she thought she was. She wanted to scream, to rage at someone, to enact the vengeance Jace hadn’t been able to. She wanted to fling the swirling mass of chaos and anger and sadness that had brewed in her chest all summer in someone’s face. It was only the knowledge that it would enrage (and possibly endanger) Jace if she were to pick a fight that got her into that BMW. No one stopped her. She’d driven away looking over her shoulder. No one had even come to the window.

 She’d barely heard a word from Jace or Alec in the past few weeks. She was trying to give them space to sort out whatever it was they needed to sort out, but their vaguely reassuring texts promising that “ _everything is fine!_ ” and “ _were cool, catch u up later_ ” simply did not inspire confidence. They were two of the biggest idiots she’d ever encountered, there was absolutely no way they were going to sort out a thorny emotional conflict unsupervised. She’d already had to talk herself out of flying to Boston several times. Before this summer, she probably would have done it. Would have charged up there and staged an intervention for them, demanded they all sit on the floor in a circle and handle this rationally and calmly. But Izzy had decided to renounce meddling. At least where the boys were concerned, she amended mentally. No promises could be made regarding school / sorority meddling. But, honestly, Izzy had no idea if she’d done the right thing by telling Jace about Alec’s feelings. She’d only been trying to help. But maybe she’d forced Alec’s hand. Maybe if she’d left it alone Alec’s crush would have simmered out to a natural, non-family imploding conclusion. She wondered if Jace had confronted Alec. Her stomach tightens, and the voice in the back of her head, the one that always sounded suspiciously like Maryse, whispered, _This is how it ends. This is how you lose them both…_

 Unannounced, Bailey, an incredibly stuck-up junior, sticks her head into the room and blows a full bubble with her gum, popping it lazily before she speaks.

 “Yo, Iz. Door for you,” she drawls.

 “If it’s Ryan, I’m not home.”

 “Nah, not him. Two guys. Both hot as shit, though. Alex and Jake, I think?”

 Izzy nearly falls off the bed. “Alec and Jace?”

 “Yeah,” Bailey agrees. “That sounds right. One’s real tall.”

But Izzy is already pushing past her, running down the stairs of the sorority house, needing to see for herself before she can believe it. A gaggle of girls lurk in the kitchen, peering into the foyer. Yep. It had to be Jace and Alec. She shoves the onlookers out of the way and finally sees them. Her first thought was confusion. Because they both looked insanely, profoundly happy. Had the world not ended?

 But before she can process anything beyond that, Jace scoops her up into a massive, crushing hug.

 “Hi baby sister,” he says into her hair.

 Izzy hugs him back, the comfort of his grip not necessarily quelling the rush of anxiety that churns in her stomach.

 “What are you guys doing here? Is everything okay? Mother--”

 “Maryse is fine. Everything’s okay,” Alec says, smiling as Jace releases Izzy and he hugs her tightly as well.

 “Alright, clear out,” Izzy barks at the girls still leaning in the door frame. “Y’all are acting like you’ve never seen a man before.”

 “Not one who looks like _that_ ,” Madison Cooper mutters under her breath. The girls all titter, although it’s not clear which boy she’s referring to.

 Jace smiles obligingly at the girls, but then quickly refocuses on Izzy.

 “Can we take you somewhere? Dinner? A drink? We’d like to talk to you, if that’s okay.” His voice is tentative suddenly, like he’s nervous.

 Izzy eyes both of them suspiciously. “You’re sure everything is fine?”

 “Yes,” Alec says emphatically. “We just… some things have changed. And we wanted to tell you in person. You’re too important… and you deserve the whole story.” Izzy doesn’t miss the way his eyes flash towards Jace as he says this, as if he’s looking for Jace’s validation. Jace nods slightly. So they were in this together. Whatever it was.

 “Let me get some shoes. I’ll be right back. Jace, don’t touch anything. By which I mean anyone,” she says, turning to head back upstairs.

 Jace and Alec laugh. “I’ll behave, don’t you worry about that.” They both laugh again, and it irks her somehow. It feels like an inside joke.

***

It’s immediately clear that they’re not going to tell her anything right away, so Izzy obligingly chatters about classes and her (soon to be ex-) boyfriend and what new bullshit their house mom was trying to pull. But once they’re settled in a little dive bar, she’s ready for information. Jace had ordered for them, bringing gin and tonics for himself and Izzy and a water for Alec. Interesting. So Alec wasn’t drinking. Izzy wonders what Jace had done to get him to give it up. Wondered how hard a fight it had been. She feels a sudden rush of gratitude for Jace, for the return of his calming presence. Alec was too intense alone, he needed Jace to tamp down his hotheaded instincts and keep him in line, nipping at his heels like a border collie.

They sit close together, facing her across the little round table. Izzy takes a pointed sip of gin. “So.”

“So,” Alec says, a hint of a smile pulling at his lips.

“Are you gonna make me guess?!” Izzy demands. “I don’t have all night.” She feels vaguely irritated by the furtive little looks the boys keep casting at each other, although she knows she has no reason to.

“Izzy,” Jace says slowly. He folds his hands on the table, leaning forward slightly. “It’s just that there’s not really an easy way to explain everything, and it’s important to us that you understand.”

“Okay,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Remember last month? When you told me that you were concerned about me and Al going back to Boston?”

“Yes…?” Izzy can’t believe they’re talking about this. She had sworn Jace to secrecy. She looks at Alec, fearful that he’ll react to this betrayal, but his face is pleasantly neutral. Goddamn their political training.

“Well. Alec and I talked about it,” Jace says.

“You talked about… what I told you?” Izzy uncrosses her arms and takes a sip of her drink. If Alec knew that Jace knew, why were they here? Why were they pretending like everything was fine?

“Yes,” Alec says. “And by the way, you’re the worst secret keeper in the world.”

“I didn’t --” Izzy starts to defend herself, and then swallows her words. “If you came here to reprimand me…”

‘’Jesus, Iz, of course we didn’t,” Alec says. “I was teasing you.” Now Alec actually does look nervous. His eyes are darting around the bar a bit, as if looking for an escape route, and he starts to pick at one of his fingernails.

Seemingly on instinct, Jace snakes out a hand and closes it over Alec’s, quieting his anxious fingers with a squeeze. Alec looks surprised momentarily, as if he didn’t even realize what he was doing. And then he relaxes slightly, intertwining his fingers with Jace’s and exhaling a heavy breath.

Oh. _Oh._

“Wait…” Izzy says, suddenly feeling profoundly stupid. “You two are… You actually...?”

Alec looks at Jace before he answers, like he needs one last reminder that it’s real, that the answer is yes. And when Jace nods slightly, Alec smiles and turns back to her. “We are. We’re… we’re together now.”

Jace smiles at him, encouraging and bright, and something inside Izzy drops with a swoop. Whatever expression she’s making is apparently not great, because Alec’s smile flickers, then drops completely. Izzy closes her eyes for a second.

“You’re like. Fully. Romantically together. Like a couple. Sexually. Like boyfriends. That’s what you’re saying?”

“We know it’s, well, weird, Izzy,” Jace says. He seems calmer than Alec. “It took us awhile to figure it out ourselves. That’s why we’ve been quiet the past few weeks. We wanted to be sure we really understood it before we told you.”

“Does Mother know?” Izzy asked, not even able to broach the thought of Robert’s reaction yet.

“Of course not,” Alec says, sounding slightly indignant. “You’re the first one we’re telling. You’re the one whose opinion matters to us.”

“The only one, honestly,” Jace adds, still holding Alec’s hand.

Izzy draws on years of cotillion practice to compose her face. It’s not that she’s trying to hide a negative reaction, it’s just that… well she’s not entirely sure what her reaction is. She’s certainly having a reaction, that’s about all she knows. She has to pull it together, for her brothers’ sake.

“I’m really, really happy for you guys. I mean -- holy shit.”

Alec looks slightly less green. “Thank you, Iz. It’s -- I mean, it’s still really new. But I think it’s good. Right, babe?” he asks, turning to look at Jace again.

Jace nods, and the two of them are staring into each other’s eyes so intently that Izzy feels like she’s intruded on something private.

“I guess… I’m just wondering how this works,” Izzy says.

“How what works?” Jace says.

Izzy gestures vaguely, not even totally sure she knows what she means. “You two… dating. I mean. We’re so young. And dating is… risky. People’s feelings change all the time, people fight over stupid shit and break up and cheat on each other and fall in love with other people and… and you guys can’t do any of those things without absolutely and seriously fucking everything up forever!”

Jace lets go of Alec’s hand. They share another quick look, this one more careful and hesitant. Izzy hates it. She’s not the one who’s supposed to be on the other end of those looks.

“Izzy, we came down here to talk about it in person with you is so we could discuss all of that,” Jace says.

“You’re part of this, and we want you to feel like you have a say in it too,” Alec adds.  

“But I don’t have a say in it,” Izzy says, knowing she sounds like a brat. “It sounds like you’ve already decided.”

“Things are going to be different,” Jace says, “but some things will never change. The three of us, that’s forever. We made you a promise, remember? The night we picked you up from that stupid house party?”

Izzy prickles, a bit defensive. “That wasn’t exactly a highlight of my high school career.”

“But we meant it, Iz. It’s the three of us, forever. Alec and I have just reconfigured things a bit. But nothing's going to change for you.”

Izzy nods because she knows it’s what she’s supposed to do, but she can feel her heart sinking through to the floor. _It wouldn’t be the same. It was never going to be the same again. They had chosen each other, closed the circle and changed the rules and left her on the outside. The one place where she wasn’t supposed to be an outsider._

She chugs the rest of her gin and tonic and stands abruptly, almost knocking over her bar stool. “Thanks,” she says. “It’s cool though. I’m super happy for you guys. But I have to go, I haven’t finished my homework.”

The boys both look crushed, and Izzy hates herself.

“Do you have to?” Alec asks. “We miss you Iz, we want to talk more.”

“Maybe tomorrow,” Izzy says quickly, slinging her bag over her shoulder. “I gotta do some reading.”

 “Izzy, if you’re upset--” Alec starts.

 “I’m not upset,” she says in a voice that very clearly sounds upset. “I think it’s great. You guys should do whatever you want to do.”

 “Okay,” Jace says evenly. “We’ll text you in the morning.”

 “We know it’s going to be hard,” Alec starts, and Izzy cuts him off without even meaning to.

 “No. It’s going to be impossible. People are never going to let you live this down!” She can hear the edge of hysteria in her voice. Alec looks stunned.

 “We’re not trying to live it down,” Jace says. “We’re just trying to live.”

 “You sound exactly like Father. That’s what he said to me, when I came out. That I wouldn’t live it down. That I was ruining my own life,” Alec’s voice is so low that Izzy, still standing and half turned to walk away, almost doesn’t hear him. Yet every word still manages to cut her.

 “Fuck you, Al. That’s a low fucking blow and you know it.”

Alec opens his hands, shrugging, his face a sad, smug _tell me I’m wrong_ smirk. And Izzy can’t. So she turns on her heel and heads for the exit.

Before she can make it to the door, she hears Jace murmur to Alec, “It’s okay. Let her go, babe.” His voice soothing. Loving.  

Izzy feels tears pricking her eyes. She rubs her eyes harshly and heads out into the sticky night.

Alec had driven them, and it’s a long walk back to campus. She should call an Uber, but she decides to walk instead. Which is probably stupid. The therapist she’d started seeing at the end of last year had pointed out that Izzy intentionally put herself in risky situations to test her own limits and try to provoke the world into hurting her. Izzy had disagreed at first, citing Jace as someone who actually embodied that description. _You’re angry at the world for pushing you so far, so sometimes you try and push back_ , she had said. _Just because your brother does the same thing doesn’t mean it’s not a problem for you too._

Whatever. Izzy checks over her shoulder and starts the walk back home. It should only take about an hour. She needed time to think.

She crams her earbuds in, then takes them out again. A concession to safety. _See_ , she thinks at her therapist, _I care about my safety_. But then she decides that talking to your therapist in your head, while walking home in the dark following a conversation in which your brothers told you they were now a romantic couple, did not necessarily broadcast mental stability.

 _Alright bitch, calm down_ she demands of herself. The essential component of this, of course, was that they weren’t actually brothers. And she knew that. And it was true that while they had always called Jace their brother, that had never been quite right. It was just that there wasn’t a better word for it, so they made do with what limited descriptors the English language provided for them. He was more like a sort of cosmic soulmate for the two of them, the counterweight that kept the family spinning. But now he was just Alec’s soulmate.

Izzy crosses the street to avoid a huddle of guys lurking on the corner. She abandons her previous safety measures and puts her headphones in. Her thoughts are echoing too loudly in her skull, she needs to drown them out somehow

In the darkest part of her heart, she had believed that Alec’s crush was one of proximity. That, thwarted by their repressive parents, he had sublimated his own sexuality, forced his desires down deep. Of course they flared up, fixated on something that was safe to want because he couldn’t have it. But now he did. What had he possibly said to Jace, to make Jace, straight, slutty Jace, change his mind?

She could understand exactly what this meant for Alec. But she couldn’t figure out what Jace was doing. And the terrible truth of it, she supposed, was that she was afraid Jace was doing this to fix Alec. To make up for Robert’s damage, to apologize for abandoning them this summer. He wanted Alec to get better, to stop drinking and heal his stupid skull and come to terms with his sexuality. And Izzy could only imagine that he was sacrificing himself, his body, his relationship with Alec to make that happen. It was unfair to Alec, and it was terribly unfair for Jace. And where would it end? Jace wouldn’t be able to do this forever, eventually he would have to admit that this wasn’t what he really wanted. And then Alec would be even more broken. He would leave a hole inside Alec and Alec would drink himself to death trying to fill it up. And what of the cost to Jace? What would it do to him to play this role? What had possibly made him think this could be worth it?

Izzy sighs. There was no way to think herself through this. She shouldn’t have stormed out, she should have fucking sat down and talked to them. She thinks of Alec. _You sound like Father_. With that single slap he had irrevocably redrawn their battle lines. He had placed Izzy on the side of Robert and Maryse, the side of the enemy. So much for the three headed monster. Izzy’s in front of a liquor store. She knows she’s being stupid, but she yanks her earbuds out and ducks inside anyway. The store is empty save for the clerk, who sits behind the counter playing some game on his phone, the sound of stylized gunshots echoing from the tinny speakers.

“Hey,” he says without looking up.

“Hi,” Izzy says, striding to the counter.

He looks up from the game. “Oh,” he says, having now seen Izzy properly. “Oh. Hello. Can I help you?”

Sometimes Izzy flirted with clerks just for fun, just to stay in practice and see if she could get free shit. But she wasn’t in the mood tonight. She grabs three minis of Bombay Sapphire and holds them up, showing him.

“$11.73,” he says in response.

Izzy throws a $20 bill on the counter and turns to go.

“Hey,” the clerk says. “I need to see your ID.”

Izzy sighs and turns back, producing her fake and handing it over.

He studies it for longer than he needs to. “So Miss Isabella Campbell, of New York, New York. What’s such a pretty girl doing drinking alone on a Friday night?”

“My boyfriend’s in the car,” she says.

The clerk smirks, clearly not believing her. He holds on to the card for another beat. Then he hands it back. “Have a good night, Isabella.”

Izzy snatches it out of his hand and is out the door in two strides, opening the first bottle before it’s even shut behind her. She downs it, feeling the soothing burn of the gin as it slides down her throat. _Pot, kettle_ she thinks, remembering Alec’s frantic descent into full tilt alcoholism this summer. Well, she wasn’t Alec. She wasn’t trying to run from anything. What did she have to run from? She was the sane one, the unbroken one of the three of them. She was the one who was supposed to remain calm and even-keeled, remain supportive and kind and untroubled no matter what crumbled around her. And fuck, had it crumbled this summer. Unbidden, the image of Alec, unconscious in his hospital bed, a breathing tube crammed down his throat, swims in front of her eyes. She blinks it away only to see instead the way Jace’s skin had hung loosely from his frame when he returned, his face hollowed and gaunt.

Izzy opens the second bottle of gin. If everything was going to hell she might as well at least enjoy the decline. She chugs that one too, and now she can feel the comforting loosening of her mind. She’s grateful for it. She wasn’t like Alec though, and she wasn’t like Robert. She wasn’t like any of them, which she supposed was part of the problem. Alec had been so unnaturally still in the hospital. Even after they pulled him from the coma, he had slept like he was fucking dead, not moving or twitching or even seeming to breath. Once she’d been there alone and, in a fit of panic she couldn’t even fully trace the origin of afterwards, she’d decided he had died in his sleep. She had risen from the couch, terrified to approach the bed, terrified to touch him and find him unresponsive. She had screamed hoarsely, hoping it would wake him, or that it would bring someone who could come and wake her from what had to be a nightmare. But he hadn’t stirred and she had started to cry, had forced herself to move towards the bed between short, frantic breaths. She’d never wanted to do anything less than touch him in that moment, because she knew, she was _certain_ that the second she did, it would be immutably clear that he was dead. She’d made herself give his shoulder a quick, rough shove. And he had stirred, flicked his eyes to her, then closed them again, settling back into the pillows.

She had thrown up in the bathroom afterwards.

She’s probably only 15 minutes from campus now. See, there was no reason at all to worry. She was perfectly fine walking home alone, just like she was perfectly fine doing everything alone. She could get used to not having the boys to lean on. But God, she was worried about them. They were going to get so much shit from the entire fucking world. It had been hard enough for Alec to come out, and now this? Izzy didn’t want him to get hurt. When she’d first figured out Alec was gay, years ago, she’d made a promise to herself that she was never, ever going to let the world’s cruelty touch him. She hadn’t necessarily been able to keep that promise, God knows he’d already been hurt. But she had meant it. But if she had sworn to stand by Alec through that, then how was this, his relationship with Jace, any different? She still owed him the same degree of loyalty, her own feelings aside. Fucking hell. It had probably really hurt Alec that she’d run out like that. Maybe she was no better than Robert. She wondered if Al was upset, back at the hotel. If Jace was comforting him. She could actually picture it perfectly, because she knew their dynamic so well. Alec would have pretended not to be upset for awhile, and then Jace would have gently teased him into admitting that something was bothering him. They _were_ incredibly good with each other, there was no denying that. There was no denying that they were perfect for each other, really. She’d never seen two people fit so wholly together. And if the only thing that really changed was what they were calling their relationship, then…

Izzy pops the third mini. Maybe she was wrong, maybe she was being just as callous and heartless as the rest of them. Christ. Who cared if Jace and Alec wanted to fuck each other? They were already madly in love, she knew that.

Feeling thoroughly miserable, Izzy finally crosses onto campus. That walk had only made her thoughts more muddled, and she’s pretty sure she’d talked herself in a full circle. She throws the empty bottles away, unwilling to bring them into the house and let anyone witness her shame. She mounts the house steps and finds a smattering of girls lounging on the porch, occupying the various couches, hammocks, and armchairs that were assembled in a motley outdoor living space.

They call out in greeting. She doesn’t particularly feel like chatting, but she leans against one of the white columns of the porch. “What’s up,” she asks noncommittally.

“Were those your brothers?” Madison demands. They’re all drinking beer, spread out in various states of recline, limbs crossing and bodies fusing messily. Izzy feels much, much older than them suddenly.

“Sort of,” she says.

“Are either of them single?” Jenna Leigh demands.

“Jenna, you have a boyfriend,” Tess sighs.

“Right now I do, yeah.”

“So does Izzy,” Madison points out. “And he came by looking for you.”

“Great,” Izzy says.

“We told him you were out with two hot guys,” Bailey laughs.

“Fucking Christ,” Izzy sighs. “Thanks for that, guys.”

“Don’t you want to break up with him? We’re helping!” Jenna says.

“Are you drunk?” Madison demands.

“Yes,” Izzy says, closing her eyes and leaning deeper into the pillar. “And I’m going to bed.”

She walks away from the group, ignoring their protests.

“You’ve barely hung out with us since school started!” Tess whines.

“Yeah, what the fuck, Iz,” Madison demands. There’s an edge to her voice. “You too good for us now?”

Izzy lets the front door slam behind her as an answer. Alone again. She drags herself upstairs and collapses on her bed, kicking off her shoes but making no further attempts to disrobe. She wants to be as uncomfortable as possible while she sleeps. It feels like a fitting punishment.

 ***

Someone’s knocking on her door. Izzy rolls over, disoriented, and checks her phone. 7:23AM.

“What the fuck?” she mutters.

“It’s me,” Jace’s voice answers.

Izzy props herself up, surprised. “Come in,” she says, running her fingers through her hair and trying to shake off the fog of sleep and last night’s gin. Jace opens the door and slips in, shutting it softly behind him. “What the fuck?” she says again, collapsing back down into the pillows.

“Good morning to you too, sunshine,” Jace says, pulling her curtains open and then sitting down on her bed. “Why are you still dressed? And shouldn’t your door be locked?”

“Because I fell asleep like this.” Izzy shrugs. “And because people come in to borrow clothes and shit. Everyone leaves their door open.” She opens one eye to glare accusingly at Jace. “Front door should be locked though. How’d you get in?”

Jace laughs. “I met some of the cross country team on their way out for a run. They were very accommodating.”

Izzy rolls away from Jace to face the wall. “I’m sure they were.”

“C’mon princess. Time to get up. We’re going to breakfast.”

“Now?! It’s the crack of dawn.”

“Yep. I wasn’t sure when you had class today. So I decided to err on the side of being early.”

Izzy sighs. After her bratty departure last night, she’s a bit surprised the boys didn’t just pick up and go back to Boston. “Hmmm,” she says.

“Don’t pretend you can resist breakfast,” Jace says, poking her in the ribs.

“Nooooo,” she moans, rolling away in mock distress. But Izzy has to admit she feels slightly mollified that Jace is trying this hard to spend time with her.

“Fine,” she grumbles as she sits up. “Where’s Al?”

“No Al. Just me and you this morning.” Jace clearly sees the flash of anxiety on her face, because he immediately shakes his head. “Not like that. I just wanted to have some alone time with you. Time for just the two of us to talk. Plus, he’s going to be asleep for like, another eight hours. I wasn’t waiting on him.”  

Izzy laughs half-heartedly, finally acquiescing and climbing from her bed. She suspects this plan was carefully calibrated between the two of them, sending Jace in alone to talk to her so she felt less ganged up on. Or Alec really was angry with her. Either way, she’d let Jace have his casual, _Alec is still asleep_ excuse.

“Is it hot already?” she asks, rummaging in her closet.

“Mhhm. But could be worse,” Jace says absently, inspecting the photo wall she’s put up above her bed. It’s mostly pictures of the three of them.

“Hey,” Izzy says as she pulls a shift dress over her head. She turns around to face Jace, pulling her hair from under the collar and tossing it back.

“Hey what?” Jace asks, still sitting on the bed.

“I’m so sorry, I didn’t even think to ask last night… is it hard? Being back in Nashville? Are you okay?” She crosses the room and touches him softly on the cheek. He smiles sadly, placing his hand over hers and holding it to his face.

“Yes. It is hard,” he says, and Izzy is surprised by his honesty, the lack of pretense or bravado. “I was nervous to come.”

“But you did anyway.” Her voice is small. “For me?” Jace takes her hand from his face and kisses her palm.

“Yes. Like we said last night. It matters to us, what you think about this. We wanted to tell you first, and in person. I decided it was worth the trip.”

Izzy drops down onto the bed next to him and buries her face in his shoulder. “That’s so nice. And I was such an asshole last night.”

Jace wraps his arms around her. “You weren’t an asshole,” he says bracingly. “You were just surprised.”

“I was kind of an asshole,” she says into his collarbone.

“Maybe a little,” Jace concedes. “But you know we love you all the more for it. C’mon,” he stands, pulling her to her feet as well. “I promised you breakfast. We can talk more when we’ve both had some coffee.”

They walk to the breakfast place just off campus, and by the time they’re both armed with coffee and have put in an order large enough for a family of five, Izzy is starting to feel better.

“Can I say something?” Izzy asks, holding her coffee in front of her face like a shield.

Jace gestures. “That’s why we’re here.”

“I”m sorry, first of all, for storming out last night. That was shitty.”

“Thank you. But it’s okay,” Jace says, taking a sip of coffee. “I think you should apologize to Alec too, though. He might need to hear that.”

Izzy nods, morose. “I will.” She takes a deep breath, steeling herself. “Second of all, I just want to say… I know it doesn’t make it better, but it really wasn’t about like, the concept of the two of you. I just…”

The waitress appears and sets down a plate of cinnamon buns in front of them.

“Did we order these?” Iz asks as she walks away.

“ _I_ ordered these,” Jace clarifies, tucking in. “But I suppose I can allow you a bite or two.”

Izzy smiles, but forces herself to refocus and push through what she needs to say. “It wasn’t about like, it being a gay thing, or a relationship thing, I just… I’m scared.”

Jace nods. “Scared of what, exactly?”

“Being left out,” Izzy almost whispers, feeling ashamed by the childish sentiment. “It’s always been the three of us, all one unit. And now you guys are… something more to each other.”

“Not more,” Jace corrects. “Just something different.”

Izzy nods, not totally believing him but appreciating the sentiment.

“Let me ask you something,” Jace says. “Did it ever occur to you that I sometimes felt left out between you and Alec? That you were the real children, the real siblings, and I was the expendable one?”

“I didn’t know that,” Izzy says startles. “And of course you’re not--”

“But I am,” Jace said. “And it’s okay. There’s something between the two of you that will always just be for you, something about your Lightwood blood and a childhood were you could only rely on each other. And you and me have something that Alec isn’t a part of. Personality wise, you and I are much more similar. We’re the fun ones.”

Izzy chuckles. “Well, that part is true,” she concedes.

“You’re my best friend. In the whole fuckin’ world,” Jace says, leaning forward, his multicolored eyes shining. “And you’re Alec’s sister. None of that is changing. Ever.”

Izzy smiles, chewing her bottom lip. She takes Jace’s hand.

“Ewww, frosting,” she says, dropping it quickly. “Use a fork!”

“Too late,” Jace says, popping more cinnamon bun in his mouth. “And give me your hand, dummy.”

She rolls her eyes but picks up his hand again.

“What else are you scared of?” Jace presses. “Also have you been eating enough? Eat some of this,” he says, pushing the plate across the table to her.

“I’ve been eating,” she says defensively, although she’s not actually totally sure that’s true. She takes a bite. “Fuck, this is good.”

“Exactly,” Jace agrees. Then he waits.

Izzy sighs. “I’m scared that you’ll break up. And then we’ll just be, like, utterly and profoundly fucked.”

“Look,” Jace says, squeezing her hand. “I’m scared of that too. Fuck, honestly, I’m terrified of it. You know I’m shit at dating. And Alec’s too important. But I don’t think being scared it will end badly is a good enough reason not to do something.”

Izzy half-smiles. “You’re real smart sometimes.”

“Sometimes?” Jace demands in mock outrage.

The rest of their food arrives, and they eat in silence for a moment while Izzy works up the courage to say something.

“I agree,” Izzy offers hesitantly. “You can’t not do things cuz you’re scared they’ll end badly. But--”

“I mean,” Jace says. “You can. And I thought about it. I thought about hiding from this. Losing Alec would be too great a cost.”

“Are there… I feel like there are other costs?” Izzy asks delicately.

“Meaning?” Jace says.

“Meaning… meaning I wonder if this is really… I don’t know if the, like, playing field here is totally level, you know?

“I truly do not know,” Jace says.

Izzy sighs. “Like, a relationship should be an equal partnership. Both parties want something the same amount, and you both get the same amount of something out of it…”

“Oh,” Jace runs his hand through his hair. “I understand.”

“Good,” Izzy says in a rush, relieved that he understands what she’s getting at about his motivations in agreeing to this. “And--”

“Listen,” Jace interrupts her curtly. His voice is calm, but there’s an edge to it that belies a brewing storm. “I know… I know what I am. I know who I am. And I know that I will never, ever, be good enough for Alec.”

“Jace,” Izzy starts.

“No. Let me finish,” Jace says, taking a deep breath. “I was never good enough to be a Lightwood. Not good enough to be the child of Maryse and Robert, and I don’t think I’m good enough to be Alec’s boyfriend. But the thing about Alec… The thing about Alec is that he’s always made me want to be better. He makes me better. And he thinks I’m enough. He’s the only one who always thought I was enough. Who didn’t think I was a project, a broken thing to be saved. He just saw me. From the very beginning, he saw me. So I know you probably think Alec’s making a mistake, being with me. But I promise you. I’m going to be a man who’s good enough for your brother.”

“Jace, no, that’s not at all -- I’m worried that you’re doing it for him. That it’s what he wants, not what you want. Not that you’re not good enough. Jesus, Jace. Never that.”

Jace smiles sadly. “Then you don’t think very highly of me, do you? Or your brother, for that matter.”

Izzy’s stomach lurches. “Of course, I do, I just--”

“You know that very first night, when I came to live with you guys?” Jace interrupts. He’s looking at her, but she’s not sure who he’s really seeing. “I was so fucking scared. I’d never been in a house that big, I didn’t know who you were, I didn’t know how to behave, who I was supposed to be. It felt like I’d been dropped into some parallel universe. I was totally unmoored. And fuck, it could have gone so badly. I could have kept becoming the man Michael was trying to make me. But that night, Alec heard me crying. I was having a nightmare. My dad had just died for fuck’s sake. Or I thought he had, at least. Anyway, Alec heard me crying, and he came into my room. He came to check on me. To comfort me. And he stayed with me, that night.”

Izzy feels tears pricking at her eyes.

“No one had ever done that before, you know? I mean, I suppose my mom must have, anyway, before she died. But nothing I could remember. That was the very first time I was upset and someone came. I can’t… I can’t even tell you what it meant to me. And it was the moment everything changed.” Jace trails off, his mind clearly elsewhere. “Do you get what I’m saying? That was it. That was the turning point. It was always going to be me and him. It was always supposed to be me and him.”

Jace bites his lower lip, running his hand through his hair and shaking his head. He seems overwhelmed by the intensity of his own feelings, and the truth of it slams into Izzy like a ton of bricks.  

“You really do love him,” Izzy says, a glimmer of wonder in her voice.

“Fuck, Iz. I do. I really do. I don’t know… I don’t know how I didn’t see it before. How I didn’t understand. But then… I kissed him.”

Izzy drops her toast. “You did? First?!”

“Yeah. On his birthday. I just. I don’t know. You know when you get knocked underwater, by a wave at the beach? And you sort of don’t know which way is up and which is down and you’re not sure if you’re going to drown?”

“Yes?”

“But then you just wait a second. And then suddenly you know, just like instinctively? Where the surface is. And you float towards the light. It was like that. I stopped fighting and let myself float to the surface.”

Izzy smiles. “Yeah. Yeah, I understand.”

“We know it’s not going to be easy. But. It’s what we both want. We’re going to tell people slowly, over time. You were the important one. Everyone else can wait. We decided that after this summer, we deserved a moment of softness. The real world will come crashing back in soon enough.”

Izzy bites her lips. “Good. I agree… God. I know. It was... I almost lost both of you this summer. I don’t know how I’m supposed to be over it.”

“You’re not supposed to be over it,” Jace says gently. “I’m not over it. Neither is Alec. We’ve been talking about it a lot. Talking about what happened, for both of us. And I’ve been going to AA with him. It’s helping him a lot.”

“Really?” Izzy is shocked.

“Mhhm. It’s helping both of us, actually.”

“That’s good. That’s really, really good.”

“And we both think you probably need to deal with it too,” Jace says, taking a long sip of coffee.

“Me? Nothing happened to me,” Izzy says, trying to brush his concern aside.

“C’mon. All for one and good for nothing, right? It happened to you too. Not just me and Alec. All of it, and this, the new relationship. It all affects you too.”

Izzy nods hesitantly. “I don’t want to, like, make it about me--”

Jace laughs, “Oh please, you make everything about you. That’s your favorite hobby.”

Izzy throws her napkin at him. “I do not… Okay well, in my defense a lot of things are already about me. So.”

“I remember you said you’d started seeing a therapist last semester. Any chance you’d go back and talk to her about all this?”

“Maybe,” Izzy says cautiously. “I guess. I don’t know that I need to.”

“Do me a favor,” Jace says. “Actually, I want you to do me two favors.”

“What?”

“Promise you’ll go back and see her. At least once. It was a hard summer and honestly, there’s going to be a lot of hard shit to come. We need you in fighting shape, Iz, you’re our only ally.”

Izzy smiles. “Okay. Promise. What’s the second one?”

“Finish your damn breakfast so we can go pick up Al. He’s going out of his mind waiting to hear how our talk went.”

“Done,” Izzy says, draining the last of her coffee. “Let’s go get him,” she says as she stands up.

“Hey wait,” Jace says, reaching for his wallet to pay. “Do you have class today?”

“Yeah,” Izzy rolls her eyes. “A lecture at 10:30, but I’m ditching. I want a do over with you two. I wanna celebrate properly.”

Jace throws some cash on the table, then slings his arm around her shoulders. “Alright kid. But just this once.”

“Oh my god you have no moral high ground here, you never go to class.”

“I am a _senior_ ,” Jace says as they leave. “It’s completely different, and, by the way --”

Izzy only half pays attention, bickering with him on auto-pilot. It feels comfortingly safe and familiar, like sinking into a warm bath. It feels like being home.

***

Alec is loitering in front of the hotel when the pull up. He reaches for the door of the back seat, but Izzy throws the front door open and jumps out before he can.

“Hel--” is all he manages to get out before she throws her arms around his neck, hugging him tightly.

“I’m sorry,” she breathes, pressing her nose into his shirt and smelling home. “I was a dick last night.”

Alec kisses her on the forehead. “You weren’t. And it’s okay. But also I kind of can’t breathe.” Izzy laughs and releases him, wiping hastily at her eyes.

Alec sees and grabs her face with both hands. “Look at me. It’s okay. I promise. And I’m sorry for what I said too.”

“No, you were totally right--”

“Okay, okay,” Jace calls from the driver’s seat. “Let’s move the love fest inside the car please.” Alec kisses Izzy on the forehead, and she gestures towards the front seat, letting him join Jace as she climbs in the back.

“Hi babe,” Jace says when Alec sits down. Alec leans over and kisses him. Izzy is shocked by how little it shocks her. It seems actually perfectly right.  She had thought it would be strange, the idea of seeing them together like that. Uncomfortable, even. But it made sense. It was in fact, perfect. They were one soul in two bodies, and those bodies had always fit together perfectly, intertwined in infinite ways to form a whole being. This was just another way. She realizes Alec is looking at her, his eyebrows knitted together in concern. She smiles back at him, nodding slightly. He visibly relaxes. They understand each other. They always have.

“Izzy’s blowing off her 10:30,” Jace announces.

“Isabelle!” Alec says.

Izzy ignores them. “Where are we going J?”

He shrugs. “Dunno. You tell us.”

“Natchez Trace,” Izzy decides. "We can walk. Be outside. Summer’s ending, we should make the most of it."

They drive to the Trace with the windows down, the day not yet too hot. Alec and Jace catch her up on everything that’s happened in the past few weeks. When they get there, they traipse across the grasses to a little grove of cottonwood trees that Izzy knows. The leaves thatch together, forming a canopy that shades the meadow. Jace throws himself down in the grass contentedly, and Alec and Izzy sit down too.

“Guys?” Izzy asks.

“Mh,” says Jace, eyes closed as he reclines.

“Can I have a do-over?”

“What?” Alec asks.

“I want a do-over. I want you to tell me again, and I want to respond the way I actually want to respond.”

The corner of a smile tugs at Alec’s mouth. Jace sits up and crosses his legs, bumping his shoulder against Alec’s.

“Okay,” Jace says. “Shoot.”

“No, we have to tell her first,” Alec says.

“Exactly,” Izzy says, pleased that they’re humoring her.

“Oh right, sorry,” Jace says.

Alec grabs her hands and stares into her eyes intently. She almost giggles. “Izzy, me and Jace are dating now. We’re in love, and,” Alec pauses for a moment, turning now to look at Jace. “We’re in love and we’re really, incredibly happy and I think we’re going to be in love for a very long time.”

“Forever,” Jace corrects.

“Forever sounds right,” Izzy says. “And I’m really, unbelievably happy for you. Because you’re my two favorite people in the world and I swear to God anyone who even thinks about giving you guys shit…”

“That part will come later,” Alec says. “And we’ll deal with it.”

“Together,” Jace says.

“The three of us,” Izzy adds, smiling back at them as they nod vehemently.

“Till the end of the line,” Alec says.

And they stay like that for awhile, lying in the meadow, listening to the sound of a babbling stream somewhere in the distance. Together.

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
